


Risks

by Xie



Series: Only Time [4]
Category: Queer as Folk (US)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-18
Updated: 2014-05-18
Packaged: 2018-01-25 15:05:20
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 51,313
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1652894
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Xie/pseuds/Xie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom.” –Anais Nin</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

  
**Risks, Chapter One**  
By Xie __

 _“And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom.”_ –Anais Nin

**Brian’s POV**

I was licking my come off the insides of Justin’s thighs when the phone rang.

I ignored it.

Justin was face down on the bed, his legs sprawled out and his body completely relaxed. He was making little murmurs of contentment every now and then, and I flattened my tongue on the smooth spot behind his balls and dragged it up to his hole, tasting myself on him and in him.

Then my cell phone rang, this time with the emergency ring tone. Only two people had it, Lindsay and Ted, and I swore if it was Ted I was going to kill him.

I crawled up over Justin’s body and lay across him while I checked the caller ID. Justin was looking at me, but I shook my head. “It’s Ted.” I answered the phone.

“What?”

Ted started some long explanation about the course of true love never running smooth and a car and the crowd outside Babylon. I rolled off Justin and sat against the headboard and pinched the bridge of my nose.

“Theodore? Can you tell me this story in twenty words or less? Preferably much less.”

Ted cleared his throat and started again. “A guy drove his car into the side of the club, you need to come down and talk to the cops and the insurance rep.”

I groaned and snapped the phone shut. Fuck.

Justin sat up and ran his hand through his hair. “What happened?”

“Some asshole drove his car into the side of the fucking club. Because, and this is my favorite part, he was mad at his boyfriend.” I finished getting dressed and put my cell phone in my pocket.

“Was anybody hurt?”

I shrugged. “Ted says just the driver. I’ll see when I get there.”

The stairs and the corner of the building were damaged, but it didn’t look as bad as I’d thought it would. Ted was talking to the cops and a woman with a clipboard and flashlight, but he broke away when he saw me.

“Sorry you had to come out.”  Ted was always in his element handling a crisis, especially one involving bureaucracy.

“So, no one was hurt?”

Ted shook his head. “Just the driver. And his injuries weren’t as bad as they’d have been if he hadn’t been, let’s say, heavily medicated.”

“A veiled accolade for drug abuse, Theodore?”

He laughed. “More like, if you’re going to get loaded enough to think it’s a good idea to drive your car into the side of a building, make sure you’re also loaded enough to withstand the impact without killing yourself.”

“Words to live by.” I could have used some medicating at that moment. I could feel a headache starting to uncoil behind my eyes. “So what the fuck happened?”

“You know how it is, he got mad at his boyfriend and decided to run him down on the steps of Babylon.” Something in the way Ted explained that made it sound like a perfectly reasonable course of action. My headache got worse.

“But he missed the boyfriend?”

“He missed the entire crowd, boyfriend included.”

“And hit the club.”

Ted nodded. “And hit the club.”

Ted and I stared glumly at the damaged corner of the building, and then he brightened. “The good news is, the driver is insured and his auto insurance will probably cover almost everything.”

I snorted. “That’s not ‘good news,’ Theodore. ‘Good news’ would be the asshole running his car into the crowd in front of Popperz instead.”

Three hours later, Ted and I were sitting on the steps of Babylon. The cops and insurance investigator and city inspectors were gone. They hadn’t made us close the club, but everyone had to use the side doors, so closing time had been even more chaotic than usual. The night was hot, and we were both sweating a little. 

I threw my cigarette on the sidewalk, and Ted took a swallow from his water bottle. “You going to the loft?”

I shook my head. “It’s only 3, I’ll be fine. Besides, there’s something I need at the house.”

When I got to the car, I hesitated. I wanted a drink, and there’s nothing like a dozen cops and someone from your insurance company breathing down your neck to keep you from having one. I almost went to the loft after all, but at the last minute kept driving and went home.

When I got there, I went into the media room and had a drink, staring out the window. It was four in the morning, but I felt too wired to sleep. I used the workout room shower and went upstairs, my hair still wet.

Justin was lying on my side of the bed, and I smiled a little, because he was holding my pillow. He always complained I kept the air conditioning set too low, so he buried himself in pillows and blankets, and slept warm and wrapped up. He even liked to sleep wrapped up in me. Sometimes I would be holding him, and he’d have the duvet pulled up to his chin, and I’d be lying there uncovered to my waist.

That night, I was a little chilled from the shower and my wet hair. I went around to the other side of the bed and slid in behind him, wrapping my arms around him and pressing myself up against his back. He nestled back against me, and I saw him lick his lips, and then his eyes fluttered open. I leaned over him and kissed the side of his face. The warmth of his skin felt good.

Justin turned around in my arms and smiled at me, his hair falling across his eyes. I pushed it back and kept running my hands through it, and then I bent down and traced his lower lip with my tongue.

He blinked at me sleepily. “So, what happened?”

“Hell hath no fury like a faggot scorned.” I kissed him again.

That seemed to wake him up, and he put his hands on my neck and then worked them up to the back of my head. “Headache?”

“Mmmm.”

“I thought you’d go to the loft.”

I nuzzled my face into his neck and breathed in his smell, and bit at his skin just a little. He laughed and arched his throat, and I smiled, my hands sliding down his body and gently opening his thighs.

He wrapped his legs around me as I moved over on top of him, and I leaned down close so he could keep his arms around my neck. He breathed “Brian” against my ear, and I touched my mouth to his, and said, “Justin,” and he sighed and then our tongues were sliding around inside each other’s mouths, and his legs tightened on me. He moved one hand off my neck and fumbled in the drawer next to the bed for a second, and then handed me the lube, without breaking our kiss. I grinned against his lips and he laughed a little.

“I want to be inside you.” I whispered it into his mouth.

I felt him smile. “I want you there.”

I slipped a lubed finger into him and gently swirled it inside him. He felt relaxed and hot. He murmured and I pulled my finger out and pressed the head of my cock against his hole, and pushed a little.

He moved his legs higher on my back and his hands down from my neck to my waist. I kept my eyes locked on his while I slowly pushed into him, and saw his eyes get darker and his skin flush.

Justin’s ass tightened on me. I pulled back and pushed in against the tightness, and groaned at the heat and resistance, and then felt him shift a little under me and open up again. I pulled back and let myself fall forward when I thrust into him, my weight resting on my arms on either side of him. He was sliding his hands up and down my arms and biting his lip, and he never stopped looking at me.

I suddenly wanted to be even deeper inside him, and I bent down and touched my forehead to his. I whispered, “Let me all the way in,” and he let me push his legs up onto my shoulders. I thrust in as deep as I could, and just held there for a minute. I thought it might be nice to stay like that for the rest of my life, buried balls-deep in Justin’s ass, all that heat and constriction pulsing around my cock.

He pushed against me and tightened, and I gasped. “Don’t.”

Justin froze underneath me, and I stayed in him, and neither of us moved. I had my eyes open and he was looking at me, and I felt like I was sinking into him, all that warm soft skin touching me everywhere. His eyes were dark, and his breathing was shallow and rapid. I felt dizzy. And then I felt him move a little under me, just the slightest rocking of his ass, and I pressed against it, let myself drop onto him, pushing his thighs back against his chest with my weight. He made a sound, it might have been my name, but I couldn’t hear anything, the blood was pounding in my ears so hard.

I made myself pull back, and his ass muscles held onto me and then relaxed when I thrust forward again, and I fucked him slow and deep, feeling the heat in my balls rising up to meet the heat of his ass, every muscle in my body burning with effort.

Justin moaned again and the sound pushed me to the edge, but I hung on, wanting to bring Justin with me. I couldn’t reach his cock and he was still holding onto me, so I began to prod at his prostate deliberately with every thrust.

There was always a moment before Justin came when his ass would get tighter and softer at the same time. I felt it change and then the first spurt of his come hit me on the chest while his fingers dug painfully into my shoulders. Then his ass muscles clamped down on me hard and I felt my orgasm surge up and spill out of me into him, everything hot and wet and spasming.

I collapsed onto him, letting his legs fall off my shoulders, and lay with my head on his chest, almost gasping, my hands holding his shoulders. We were both drenched in sweat, and his chest was covered in come. I couldn’t move.  
 **  
Justin’s POV**

I woke up in the morning, and Brian was sound asleep. He didn’t wake up when I got out of bed or even when I was in the shower. I thought about hiding the clock and taking his cell phone with me, but I didn’t know what was going on at Kinnetik or the club that day, so I just went downstairs and made coffee.

I booted up my computer in the studio and looked at Michael’s notes for the next issue of Rage. We were getting together to try to come up with some kind of schedule so it could come out before the end of the year, but not interfere with my show in December. Which was basically impossible, as far as I could see, but I agreed we had to try to find a way.

The story had ended with a cliffhanger, with Rage, JT, and Zephyr cornered and faced with either surrendering themselves or seeing hundreds of innocent citizens of Gayopolis die. Zephyr had been injured fighting the zombies, and JT had completely drained himself trying to use his newly developed, but still untrained, ability to strengthen Rage’s powers.

I chewed on my lip for a little while, and then picked up the phone and called Michael at the store.

“Hi, Justin.” He sounded distracted, and I heard his cash register ringing.

“Hey. I was just seeing what time you wanted to get together today.”

“It’s crazy in here today, can it be after I close?”

“Yeah, let’s meet at the loft, though, it’s more comfortable than the store.”

Michael snorted. “I don’t know, our record of producing the comic at the loft isn’t so good.”

I laughed. “I think between the two of us, we can keep Rage from wrecking the lair.”

I ate some lunch and started working on my painting, a mug of my acupuncturist’s noxious tea in my hand. She’d changed the formula slightly, and it actually tasted less disgusting than it used to.

I was working in my studio when I heard Brian come downstairs, talking on his cell. He was still talking on it when he came in a little later, set his half-empty coffee cup on the floor, and threw himself on the sofa. I put my brush down and sat cross-legged on my worktable, waiting for him to get off the phone. He finally snapped it shut and let his head fall onto the sofa back.

“The engineer’s report won’t be to the city for a few days, but he said it’s structurally sound, so Ted is trying to get the city to let us stay open until then.”

“If they were going to close you down, why didn’t they do it last night?”

“Because the morning people aren’t as bright as the nighttime people?”

“Okay.”

He got up and knocked back the rest of his coffee like it was scotch. “Okay, I’m going to shower and go. Are you still meeting Michael tonight?”

I nodded. “Come by the loft after work, we can eat.”

His phone rang again and he sighed, picked up his mug, and snapped “Kinney” into the phone as he walked out of the room.

By the time I had to leave to meet Michael, I was feeling really good. My hand didn’t hurt, and the sixth painting was finished and drying. I showered and hesitated just a minute before shoving some club clothes into my bag, in case Brian wanted to go to Babylon later. Unlike him, I didn’t keep an entire second wardrobe at the loft.

I buzzed Michael into the loft a little past 5. He was carrying a folder, a bag of chips, and a six-pack of Coke.

After we had his notes and my sketchpad spread out on the table, I pulled out my calendar.

“I have to have all my pieces done for the show before Thanksgiving. That’s non-negotiable, even if it means we miss our deadline. But I’ll do everything I can, short of having my hand fall off, to get it done in time. I can’t do anything better than that.”

Michael looked at me for a minute, and then shook his head. “You have to promise to stop a long time before your hand falls off. I’m way more scared of Brian than I am of you, and he’d rip my spine out if I let that happen.”

I laughed. “I promise not to let my hand get anywhere close to falling off. Deal?”

“Deal.”

I had to go to New York twice in the next two months, including next week, and so we sat and filled in a series of semi-realistic deadlines on the calendar. I added the tentative release date of the issue we’d just finished, which was just right after I got back from New York.

“We should have a party for the new issue release.”

I frowned. “Do we have to?” Rage release parties didn’t exactly mark the high points of my life so far.

“Just a little thing at my house.”

I looked at him.

“Okay, not at the house. At the store?”

I sighed, but agreed. Maybe we’d get it right this time.

We started to go over the story itself, and I showed him a few rough sketches I’d done for some key scenes and a new character. After a while we were more talking than working, and I noticed Michael looked really tired.

“How’s Ben doing?” I almost didn’t ask, because I was never sure if it made Michael happy I cared, or irritated that people treated Ben like he was an invalid. But Michael looked kind of relieved, if not exactly happy, that I asked.

“He’s fine, but it seems like every time his viral load gets back to undetectable, his pancreatic enzymes start creeping up again, and then they back off the meds, and then his viral load starts going up. It’s kind of driving us both crazy.”

I frowned. “And can’t that create resistance in the virus, too? To the drugs?”

Michael got up and went into the kitchen and grabbed us both a Coke from the fridge. “Yeah. Exactly. Although so far, we haven’t run out of drugs, so it’s less of a concern. But if this keeps happening…” and he shrugged, but he looked pretty upset. He hadn’t sat back down, so I stood up and steered him over to the sofa.

“Have you told Brian any of this?”

“This is all the same stuff that’s been going on that you already know about, except we just found out about the latest increase in his enzymes yesterday. That’s the only part he doesn’t know.”

I sighed and let my head fall back onto the sofa cushion, and then I sat up. “We need pot.”

Michael laughed. “Brian did such a good job raising you.”

“He’s very proud.”

I went into the bedroom and got Brian’s stash out of his latest super-secret hiding place, and Michael and I got stoned. There may not be a cure for HIV, but I knew the cure for hopeless frustration was recreational drugs and snack foods. Like Michael said, Brian raised me well.

**Brian’s POV**

When I’d gotten to Kinnetik that afternoon, I slammed in the front door and everyone froze and then ran off to wherever they should have been in the first place. I went into my office, put my briefcase down on my desk, and took a sip of my triple shot latte as I sank down into my chair. I booted up my laptop and watched the clock, timing it to the second when Ted would appear at my door.

“Don’t you ever get tired of scaring the shit out of everyone who works here?”

I took a sip of coffee. “No.” I raised an eyebrow at him.

“We’re not being shut down, the engineer convinced the city that the damage wasn’t structural, but we have to use the side doors until the shoring work is done. Which should be by tomorrow morning.”

Apparently Ted was the canary in the coalmine of my temper, because just then Cynthia stuck her head in the door. “I heard someone took a piece out of Babylon last night, so I rescheduled your lunch to Friday and moved your 11 o’clock meeting to 3. So you can drink seven or eight of those things, become human again, before you actually have to interact with anyone.”

I glared at her. I hated it when the two of them ganged up on me.

Cynthia just laughed. “Okay, if you’re really enjoying your miserable mood, you could go down to the art department and frighten a few people. I’ll get you a list.”

I frowned at my laptop, which was showing nothing more offensive than a friendly reminder that I had mail. I glanced at the two of them. “Anything else?”

They looked at each other, then back at me, shook their heads, and left.

I spent what was left of the day on the phone, and called Justin on his cell at around 7. He answered sounding happy.

“Hey!”

“You’re stoned.”

He giggled. I pressed hard on the space between my eyes. Michael and Justin stoned together at the loft. This was going to mean trouble.

“So, we’re hungry.”

“I’m stunned.”

“And we were thinking…”

“That I could get some food? Why didn’t you just get something delivered?”

“We were thinking Greek food from that new place. And they don’t deliver.”

I agreed to be their Greek food delivery boy and hung up the phone.

When I got to the loft I braced myself to open the door and find a disaster, but other than Michael and Justin sprawled out on the floor in front of the sofa, and an empty potato chip bag on the kitchen counter, it was remarkably peaceful inside.

When the door slid shut with a bang, Justin jumped up, a huge smile on his face. He raced over and threw his arms around my neck.

“Food!”

I burst out laughing and set everything down on the kitchen counter, gesturing to the bags and containers. “Knock yourselves out.”

I went into the bedroom and changed into jeans and a white t-shirt, and padded out in my bare feet to get a drink. Michael and Justin were standing at the kitchen counter shoving souvlaki and spanikopita into their mouths, and arguing over what kind of sauce was in which container. I sat on the bar stool and pulled a piece of pita bread apart.

“So, tell Brian about the thing with Ben.” Justin’s mouth was full of food, and he had tzatziki on his lower lip.

I looked at Michael. “What happened?”

“Ben’s pancreatic enzymes went up again, they’re taking him off his meds.”

I put a hand on the back of my neck and squeezed. “Fuck.”

Michael nodded, and put a forkful of Greek salad in his mouth. “He’s okay, his viral load was zero, and they’re starting him on a new combo instead of just waiting this time.”

Michael headed out after they finished eating, swearing the walk back to the store would sober him up enough to drive, and if not, he’d call Ben. I went out in the hall and hung onto him for a little while, and then watched him run down the stairs. I went back inside and slid the loft door shut. Justin was cleaning up the kitchen, still picking at the leftovers, and humming to himself.

I poured another drink and went over to the stereo and tried to find a CD I felt like listening to. I finally put on the satellite radio and found some kind of electronic ambient music that seemed to match my mood, and left it there.

Justin had come and stood next to me, and as I turned around he slid his arms around my waist and put his hands on my back under my t-shirt. I let myself relax into him after a minute.

He rested his head on my shoulder. “Let’s never sell the loft.”

I kissed the top of his head and then put my hand on his neck, under his hair. “Okay.”

He sighed. “I mean, even if we go broke. Never sell the loft.”

I pulled back and looked at him. “Why would we go broke?”

He laughed. “In case you decide to risk everything again and bring down an evil politician.”

I thought about it for a minute. “I’d have to be trying to bring down Santorum to lose everything now.”

“That works for me.” Justin put his hands behind my head and pulled me in for a kiss. His lips were so soft and his tongue was so gentle in my mouth I forgot what we were talking about.

Justin was on his toes, and let his hands fall down to my shoulders. He leaned into me and put his mouth next to my ear. “Let’s stay here tonight. I want to make love here.”

“Before or after I design a campaign to unseat Pennsylvania’s right wing senator?”

He just gave me a big smile and pulled me into the bedroom.

I took the duvet off the bed and went into the bathroom, and when I came back out, Justin was lying on the bed. He was naked and pale on the dark sheets, although, despite his best efforts to slather himself in equatorially-enabled sunscreen products, he had just the faintest tan line at the crease of his thighs and above his pubes.

I leaned down and traced his tan line with my tongue, and then ran it up to his navel and rested my cheek on his stomach while I watched his cock go from half-hard to hard without my even touching it.

And then I touched it. I let my tongue lick at the head, flattening out over the smooth skin, tasting salt on my tongue when I lapped at his slit. His hand found my hair, and I shifted myself down his body, and looked up at him, grinning. He smiled kind of dreamily at me, and I buried my face between his thighs and licked and sucked his balls and his cock until he came hard, his come shooting down my throat and his ass clenching around my finger.

I was lying with my face on his stomach when he gave my hair a little tug. I crawled up next to him and pulled him into my arms.

“Hey.”

I smiled at him. “Hey.”

“That was great.”

I kissed his hair. “Greek food turns me on.”

“You didn’t eat any.”

“Seeing you eat Greek food turns me on.”

Justin rolled over and lay on top of me. I let him pin my wrists to the bed and kiss me.

“Justin?”

“Mmmm?”

“Do you feel like going to Babylon?”

He lifted his head and looked at me. “Don’t you want your dick sucked?”

“You can suck it at Babylon.”

He laughed. “Okay.”

We showered and changed, and I drove over to the club. There were still police tape and construction barriers around the front entrance, and Justin stopped and looked as we walked by.

“Fuck.”

“Could have been worse.”

“It’s been worse.”

I nodded.

We walked past the line waiting to get in and the sound and beat washed over us both. I’d wanted to drive so I hadn’t taken anything before we left, but I rectified that deficiency with some E the minute we got to the bar, and then Justin smiled and took a hit off my tongue.

“We’re going to get into trouble tonight, aren’t we?” He’d swallowed the E but still had his mouth up against mine.

I just smiled at him and then asked the bartender for two bottles of water. He was new, and hastily hid his smile when I glared at him as he handed them over. Justin laughed and dragged me out on the dance floor.

Alfe was the DJ that night, and so of course every time something new started playing, Justin’s face would light up and he’d tell me, “Oh, I love this song!” I was in the mood to love everything that night, especially with Justin nibbling my throat and dancing so tight against me it was almost a sex act.

I was running my hands through Justin’s hair and he was holding onto my upper arms when I heard a familiar giggle next to me. I opened my eyes and saw a flash of purple and an explosion of curly hair.

“Daphne. What are you doing here?” It was Justin, his face flushed.

She giggled again, and gestured behind her. Alfe was grinning at me, his hand resting casually on her bare shoulder. “I was in the DJ booth with Alfe and we saw you basically fucking on the dance floor. Hey, Brian.”

I leaned over and kissed her cheek without letting go of Justin. “Well, don’t break anything in the DJ booth, I’m still paying for the new sound system.”

Justin smiled radiantly at Alfe. “The music’s great tonight.”

He laughed and patted Justin’s arm. “I’d appreciate the compliment more if I didn’t have the feeling you’d be just as happy with polka music in your current condition. But I’m glad you’re having a good time. Keeps the boss happy.” He and Daphne turned to go, and she looked back over her shoulder and waved and winked at Justin.

He watched them walk away, and then nestled back into my arms. “I want a drink. Not water.”

I kissed him. “And then I think you owe me a blow job.”

He smiled. “We can credit it against the thousands you owe me.”

“Or you can blow me.”

He laughed. “Or I can blow you.”

I kissed him and then got him a drink at the bar. I almost took him into the backroom for old time’s sake, but at the last minute I went upstairs to the VIP room. I laughed when he started tugging at my belt before we even got in the door, and let him push me against the first wall we came to. He was lifting up my shirt with one hand and kissing my stomach while his other hand undid my pants, and I arched my back and gasped when his mouth surrounded my cock while he cupped and cradled my balls. He was pressing his finger on my perineum and humming deep in his throat around my cock, and in about two minutes I couldn’t hold back anymore and came with my hands grabbing his hair.

He stood up almost immediately and fastened his mouth on mine. I was sagging against the wall so he didn’t have to stand on his toes, and he fed me my come with his tongue, and then pulled my right hand to his cock while he pressed against me. I opened his jeans and pushed them down on his hips, and kept my mouth pressed to his while I gently turned him around. His head was twisted back so he could keep kissing me, and he leaned back against my body while I slowly jerked him off.

After a minute he broke away from the kiss and let his head fall back on my shoulder. I was holding almost his entire weight against me, my arm across his chest, and he was breathing hard. I nuzzled his hair and let my hand speed up, and then pulled my other arm back and reached between us, stroking his balls from behind, feathering my touch over the smooth spot behind them, and then trailing a finger over his hole.

His cock got rigid in my hand and his balls felt hot and full, and then his breath caught in his throat. He turned his face into my neck, drenching my hand with his come, and spurting big ropes of it out onto the floor.

I let him turn and burrow into me while his heart and breathing slowed to normal, resting my cheek against his hair. Finally he lifted his face up and smiled at me. “That was nice.”

I kissed him. “Yeah, it’s fun now and then to have sex standing up.”

“With an audience.”

I smiled. “I didn’t think you noticed.”

He rolled his eyes, and we cleaned ourselves off, straightened out our clothes, and went to find Daphne and Alfe in the DJ booth. We hung out with them for a while, and then danced to a few more songs. I was about to call the car service, but Alfe offered to drive the Corvette and then let Daphne drive him back, so Justin went with her and I went with my car.

Alfe seemed to show the proper respect for the car, and I relaxed a little. Daphne must have warned him.

“So, you and Daphne?”

He nodded. “She’s pretty cute.”

“Deceptively so.”

“I told her you said she was small but deadly. It seemed to make her very happy that you thought so.”

I rubbed my arm. “She hits.”

He burst out laughing. “I’m going to guess you deserved it. What did you do?”

“I’d misplaced Justin.”

He didn’t say anything at first. “I think I’m just going to not ask.”

I nodded. “Wise decision.”

We pulled up in front of the loft, and Alfe turned off the ignition and handed me the keys. “See, was that so painful?”

I grabbed them from him and locked the car carefully. Justin was climbing out of Daphne’s car, and I could hear them laughing. He leaned on me and waved goodbye to her, and then we went inside. He stood against me in the elevator, his head on my chest.

“You must be happy the Corvette’s right outside, waiting for you all safe and sound.”

I tightened my arm around him as we got to the top floor, and lifted the gate up with my free hand. I got the door open and pulled two bottles of water out of the refrigerator, but by the time I got into the bedroom, Justin was burrowed into the pillows, sound asleep. I set one bottle on each side of the bed, took a piss, and climbed in next to him.

**Justin’s POV**

On Thursday night, I was sitting at my computer and talking to Kalli on my cell phone. I had to go to New York the next day for a party and opening at Armand’s gallery, and I was supposed to stay with her. She’d taken her new full time salary and used it to get a place with air conditioning, but it had gone out, and I was going to spend the extra money and get a hotel room. My memories of the previous summer were sweaty and gross, and this summer was hotter than the last.

At around 10, I heard Brian putting the car in the garage, and went out and met him in the hall. He looked surprised to see me. I had been working kind of intensely for the last few days.

“Hey.”

“Hey. I was going to work out and then swim, have you eaten?”

“Yeah, I had a sandwich, did you bring home something good?”

He laughed. “There’s Thai food on the counter. I’m done, so just put what you don’t want in the fridge. And come swimming in a little while.”

I shook my head. “I can’t swim until…”

“Right. Half an hour after eating.” He rolled his eyes. “Then come watch me swim.”

I ate Thai food out of the container and went back to my studio, but when I heard Brian dive into the pool, I stripped off my jeans and paint-covered t-shirt, and went out and sat on the edge watching him swim. The underwater lights were on, and his tanned body was slipping through the water, his arms breaking the surface and then cutting back down.

When he was done doing laps he swam up to me, and took my hand and tugged me in. The water was shallow so I just laughed and waded over to the steps and sat there with him, cooling off from the hot night air. He pulled me up onto his lap, and my ass slipped down in the space between his legs. I put my arms around his neck.

“I’m going to hate it when the summer’s over and we can’t use the pool.” I kissed his neck. “The smell of chlorine turns me on now.”

He looked at me. “It’s only August. We have a month of summer left.”

I sighed. “Yeah, but I’m working and then I have to go to New York. And the next thing you know, it’s going to be September and Gus’ birthday. And he’ll be six. I can’t even believe it.”

Brian didn’t say anything, just ran his hands up and down my arms. I tightened my grip on his neck and kissed him.

“Did I mention the smell of chlorine turns me on?”

He smiled lazily. “No, why don’t you show me?”

I kissed him and turned in his arms, wrapping my legs around his waist and lifting my ass up. Brian moved down a step so the water was deeper. He leaned back and grabbed the oil-based lube from where it was lying under a fold in the towel he’d left by the stairs.

“So, this is what you meant by asking me to come swimming with you?”

He kissed me again. “Mmmm hmmm.”

He slicked his cock with lube and then slid a finger into my ass and gently opened me up. I closed my eyes and let his finger press and slide inside me, my head on his shoulder. I tipped my head back when he put his hands on my hips and settled my ass over his cock, and I let my breath out when he slowly lowered me onto him.

When he was all the way inside me I curved into him again, my arms on his shoulders and our foreheads pressed together.

“God, I love you.” I groaned when I said it.

He didn’t answer, just thrust up into me as he pulled me down, and I groaned again. I was rocking on his lap and letting the motion of the water and his hands move me up and down on his cock. I took one arm off his shoulder and wrapped my hand around my cock, and started jerking myself off with the same rhythm of his fuck.

It was dreamy and peaceful, but I felt the heat start building up in my balls and my hand moved faster. He pressed his face into my neck and bit me, and spread his legs farther apart and pulled me down a little faster. I felt his cock hit against my prostate and it pushed me over the edge, my come spilling onto my hand and into the cold water.

Brian’s fingers dug into my hips hard, and I felt him start to come inside my ass while I clenched on him. I loved how hot his come felt when he fucked me in the pool.

I stayed where I was for a long time after we both came, until his cock got soft and started to slip out of me. He pulled me off and then back into his lap, but I twisted around and knelt on the step between his legs, kissing him. Then I stood up, took his hand, and we went up to bed.

**Brian’s POV**

On Friday morning, I dropped Justin at the airport and went to Kinnetik. Ted was waiting in my office, never a good sign.

“What’s up?”

“We need to go to Chicago and then to Washington DC on Monday. We have to meet with Remson’s attorneys to get an overview of the wording on their new ad, and then meet with Remson himself, and he’s stuck in DC talking to the FDA.”

“Their timing sucks.”

Ted nodded. “I know Justin’s just getting home Sunday night….”

“Theodore. I can bear to be away from Justin for a few nights, that’s not the problem. The problem is the goddamned Redland-Moss meeting.”

“Cynthia called them, they’re thrilled we’ll be in Chicago, saves them a trip here.”

There were good things and bad things about doing presentations out of the office. “Can Cynthia come to Chicago?”

“She can.”

“Okay, tell her to set it up. And have Cynthia set it up, not Elaine. I don’t want any fuck ups on this.”

“Is Elaine fucking up?”

I shook my head. “No. But have Cynthia do it anyway.”

“Will do.”

God, I hated that expression. “Any other good news?”

He grinned at me. “The coffee machine’s broken, and it won’t be fixed until 4 this afternoon.”

“I hope you’re in the mood to run to Starbucks several times before 4.”

He laughed and waved over his shoulder as he left the room. I sighed and buzzed Elaine to find someone to go to Starbucks for me.

Around 2, Justin phoned to say he'd checked into the hotel, and while I was on the line with him, Michael called. I told Justin later, and switched over to Michael.

“Hey. I was wondering if I could come by the house after work tonight.”

Michael and I often got dinner after work, but he almost never came to the house. “Is this a ‘keep Brian company while Justin’s out of town’ rescue mission?”

Michael laughed. “It’s actually not. I need to talk to you about something.”

That sounded ominous. “Everything okay?”

“I’m fine, Ben’s fine, I just want to talk.”

Michael’s car was in the driveway when I got home, and he was sitting with his feet in the pool. He looked up when I came in the gate. “It’s so nice out here.”

I nodded. “Let me change and get us some beers.”

I pulled on some swim trunks and grabbed a couple of beers, and stopped and ordered a pizza before going back outside.

I twisted the top off a beer and handed it to Michael, and then sat down next to him. “So, what the fuck’s the matter?”

“I need to ask you a favor. Hang on.” Michael got up and got a folder off the table, and handed it to me. He sat down next to me, and put his feet back in the pool. But he didn’t look at me.

I opened up the folder and started reading. It was about Remson’s latest clinical trial, for a new combination therapy for people who were failing on their HIV regimen. He’d highlighted a section on patients with recurrent pancreatitis.

“You want me to find out about this for Ben, from Remson?”

“Can you?”

“Did you try to enroll him through the front door?”

“We were out of their geographic area. But we’ll travel, it’s just to New York.”

“But he qualifies otherwise?”

He nodded. “I wouldn’t ask but we’re running out of options, and I just…”

“You can shut up now.”

Michael sighed. “I’m sorry. I …”

“I know.” I bumped my shoulder into his. He leaned all the way back and stared up at the sky, his arms back over his head. He looked like a kid.

“This is why you warned me about getting involved with Ben, isn’t it? Not that I’d get infected, you said to fuck him if I wanted, but not to fall in love with him. Because then he might die.”

I didn’t say anything, and after a few minutes of silence Michael sat back up and rested his head on my shoulder. I wrapped my arm around him and stared at our feet in the water.

“I didn’t know what I was talking about.”

“Yeah, you thought we get to pick who we fall in love with.”

I turned my head and looked at him under my lashes, and he had that asshole “I know you even if you think I don’t” look that I hated.

“We need to get stoned.”

He laughed. “I can always count on you. But I have to drive home, so not tonight.”

I shook my head. “I can call the car service if you can’t drive, and bring the car back tomorrow. You need drugs. Trust me.” I stood up and held out my hand, and he took it and let me pull him to his feet.

The pizza came, and we ate it in front of the television, watching _Star Wars_ on DVD.  I was sitting on the sofa, and Michael was on the floor, his back against it. I picked up the remote control and turned the TV off when the movie was over, and Michael picked his forgotten beer up off the floor and finished it off. I’d switched to scotch an hour before.

Michael kept his eyes on the now-blank television screen. “I just don’t want to think about what it would be like if he died.”

I finished what was in my glass. “Then don’t think about it.”

He tipped his head back and looked at me. “It’s not that simple.”

I didn’t say anything right away. “I guess not.”

Michael turned around, and I could see he was hesitating. I silently willed him not to say whatever he was thinking about saying, but as usual with Michael, it didn’t work.

“What would you do if Justin died?”

I pushed myself off the sofa and got up and went to the bar. “Jesus, Mikey.”

He sat up. “I’m serious.”

I shrugged. “First of all, I’m twelve years older than he is, and I’ve already had cancer. As long as Justin avoids baseball bats and bombs, I don’t think it’s going to come up. Okay?”

“What’s the second thing?”

“The second thing is, you don’t want to know.” I had poured more scotch into the glass, and I drank it down in one gulp. “Can we not talk about this?”

“We’ve both had people we love almost die.”

“Lots of people die every day, and people love them. That’s life. Fucked though it is. Why the fuck do you want to talk about this? Ben’s fine right now, you said so yourself.” I carried the bottle over to the sofa and left the glass on the bar. Mikey was so not coming over here again if he didn’t change the subject.

My powers of mind control seemed to be working now, because he shrugged, got up from the floor, and went to the DVD cabinet. “Do you have _The Empire Strikes Back_?”

I burst out laughing, and got up and went and stood next to him and examined the DVD titles. “Do you have to call Ben and tell him you’ll be late? Because I think we’re gonna be here for a while.”

**Justin’s POV**

I was asleep in my air-conditioned hotel room when the phone rang. I grabbed it in time to look at the caller ID, but I’d known it was Brian before I looked.

“Hey.”

“Did I wake you up?”

“Mmmmm.”

“Kind of early for bedtime in New York, isn’t it?” He sounded amused.

I stretched and rubbed my hand through my hair, but didn’t open my eyes. “Long day.”

He was silent for a second. “Mine, too. Michael came over, he just left.”

I laughed. “You’re a bad influence on him.”

“On everyone. I work hard at it.”

“You’re drunk, too.”

“I am. Just a little. Is Kalli there?”

“No, she went back to swelter at her place.” I rolled onto my side, holding the phone to my ear and burrowing into the pillows. “I miss you.”

“Do you know what I miss? Your skin. I wish I was touching it right now.”

“I wish you were right here, touching me.” I ran my hand down my chest and lightly stroked my cock, feeling it get hard in my fist. “Brian… are you in bed?”

“Mmm hmmmm.”

“Are you naked?”

“Yeah.”

I smiled. “Me, too.”

He chuckled. “Are you hard?”

“I am now. Are you?”

“What do you think?”

“I think if you were here you’d have your cock up my ass, and I’d be really, really happy.”

“Do you want my cock up your ass?”

I was stroking my cock a little harder. “I always want your cock inside me, Brian. I feel all empty right now.”

“Don’t you have a dildo, Justin?” He still had that amused tone in his voice, but it was a little huskier.

I laughed. “No, I don’t usually travel with sex toys. Do you?”

“Travel with sex toys, or have a dildo?”

My breath caught. “Brian, do you have a dildo? I mean, in bed with you right now?”

“Yes.”

I felt dizzy for a second, and turned over onto my stomach, my right hand slipping under me and my left holding the phone. “Brian…. Are you holding it?”

“Yeah.” I could hear him breathing.

“Is it in you?”

“No.”

“Make it wet, Brian. And your fingers, make them really wet.”

I heard rustling sounds on the other end. “Okay. It’s wet, and my fingers are wet.” And then he waited.

I felt my cock jerk, thinking about him waiting for me to tell him what to do with his lubed fingers. “Reach down and put one finger at your asshole, but don’t put it in, just move it around the opening.”

I heard his breathing change. It sounded ragged.

“Are you touching your hole?”

“Yeah.”

“Press just the tip of your finger in.” I was lightly pumping into my own fist, my hips raised just a little off the bed. I heard him groan.

“Brian…. Push it in some more. All the way in.” I listened to him breathing hard, and heard just the tiniest groan. “Did you touch your prostate?”

“Uh huh.”

“Do it again. Rub it.”

This time his groan was louder.

“Put another finger in.”  I shuddered a little at the sound of his moan, and felt my balls get full and my cock get even harder. I slowed down my thrusts a little.

“Brian, do you have two fingers inside? Are you rubbing yourself the way I rub you?”

“I miss your tongue…”

This time I groaned. “Brian…”

We just breathed for a minute. “Okay, Brian, that’s enough, is there lots of lube on the dildo?”

I heard him give a little sigh. I imagined his fingers pulling out of his ass, and wished I was there, and they were my fingers. I pulled mine off my cock and put them in my mouth and sucked on them, imagining I’d be pushing them into Brian. Imagining I was going to be fucking Brian.

“It’s really wet.”

I smiled. “Okay, put it at your hole, and push in just the tip, then stop.”

I waited a second. “Is it in?”

“Yeah.” He could hardly talk. His voice was hoarse.

I rolled over onto my back and put my wet fingers at my hole, and slid one in, then the other. “Push it in a little more, Brian.”

I heard him grunt, and knew just what he was doing, how his skin was flushed and his feet were pressing hard on the mattress, his knees falling apart. I started fucking myself with my fingers, and I let the phone drop down next to me on the pillow and grabbed my cock with my other hand.

“God, Brian.” I couldn’t stand it anymore and pulled my fingers out, and rolled over again, fucking my fist under me. I felt like I was going to explode, thinking about his thighs lying open, and his cock against his stomach, all hard and dripping, and how I wanted to fuck him, or suck on him while he fucked himself with the dildo, and hating this hotel and this strange bed, and even the phone. “Brian, Brian…”

He gave a gasp. “Justin…fuck…” and then I heard him start to come, the sharp groans he made when his ass was clenching and his cock pulsing, and I slammed into my fist one last time and came, the blood pounding in my ears.

I was lying flat out, my face buried in the pillow. I pulled the phone close to my ear again, and sighed.

“Hey.”

“Hey.”

“I hate this part.”

He was quiet for a second. “Me, too.”

“I wish you were here.” I wanted him to hold me.

“Me, too.”

I sighed again, and scooted to the edge of the bed and picked up my t-shirt, and wiped my hand with it. I shifted the phone to my other hand, and wrapped my arm around myself, tucking my hand under my cheek. I could feel my hair brush against the back of my fingers.

“When I was here before, when I was living here, I couldn’t sleep a lot of nights. It was really hot, and I missed you, and I’d lie there sometimes and pretend you were holding me.”

I stopped talking for a minute, because I suddenly felt my throat close up and my eyes and nose start to burn. Brian didn’t say anything, but I could hear him breathing softly.

“Sometimes I’d touch my hair and pretend it was you touching it.” I probably shouldn’t have told him that.

There was a long silence on the other end, and I pulled back the phone to make sure the call hadn’t disconnected.

He sounded pretty normal. “Did it help?”

I shrugged. “Yeah.”

Another long silence. God, I hated the fucking phone.

“I used to pretend, too.”

I felt that burning in my nose again, but I smiled, too. “Yeah? You missed me?”

“Whenever you were gone, Justin, I missed you.”

I rolled back onto my stomach, and rested my forehead on my arm. “Fuck.”

“Hey… don’t cry.”

“I’m not.”

Neither one of us talked for a while. Then Brian sighed. “We should go to sleep.”

“Yeah.”

There was another silence, and then I heard him give a sort of huff.

“Have I mentioned how much I hate the phone?”

I laughed. “Once or twice.”

“Later.”

“Later.”

It was a long time before I fell back to sleep.


	2. Risks, Chapter 2

  
  
**Risks, Chapter 2  
** By Xie

“ _Only those who risk going too far can possibly find out how far one can go_.” -T.S. Eliot

**Brian’s POV**

****It was the hottest, most humid day we’d had all summer, but late that afternoon, it started to rain. Ted came back from a meeting, and I frowned as he walked across the office, dripping all over the floor.

“Good thing this place has a central drain, although when I bought it, that wasn’t what I thought I’d be using it for.”

Ted went into my bathroom and came out with a towel, and used it to rub his head. “I doubt this is what you had in mind with the towels in the private bathroom, either.”

I smirked at him. “So, how did it go?”

“I’d say it went well. Jennifer says she can have the offer to us sometime tomorrow for our review, and then she’ll present it as soon as possible. She’s optimistic.”

I drummed my fingers on my desk. “I hate the fact that they know it’s us, we’re at a disadvantage.” I wanted to expand Kinnetik to the warehouse next door, which had just come on the market.

Ted nodded. “Jennifer says no problem, we can set up the offer a number of ways so they won’t know.”

“Good. So, Theodore, what will we do with all that space?”

Ted looked at me speculatively. “First, I’m guessing you’ll spend at least twice what I’d like you to, redesigning the space. Then, let’s see, you’ll move the art department as far, far away from your office as possible, so you won’t have to hear their screams for mercy or the sounds of the whips as the overseer lashes them into submission.”

I got up and clapped him on the shoulder, although I regretted it as a little cloud of water droplets splashed out around my hand.  “So, why don’t you go dry off in your own office, and then we can talk about hiring a guy with a whip. I’m sure you can find someone.”

“Brian? It’s five o’clock, I was actually thinking about going home.”

I looked at him blankly. He sighed. “Right. I’ll be right back in, let me change into something dry.”

When Ted got back to my office, I’d ordered pizza, and we ate it at the conference table while we went over the details of a counter-proposal a client in Chicago had made. It was a start-up internet company, which normally was something I’d run from, but it was a guy who’d sold his last internet start-up for a few million dollars, and was starting a non-profit organization to coordinate funding for lesbian and gay causes. He wanted to advertise it both in the gay media, and in the high tech media, with a single campaign geared to both instead of a separate campaign for each.

I needed Ted to make sure that the do-gooder discount didn’t eat the bottom line entirely. At around 7, Blake pushed open the door to my office.

“You guys just about done?” His hair and jacket were a little wet from the rain.

Ted smiled, and Blake came over to the table and leaned lightly against him. “What are you working on?”

I didn’t let Ted answer. “I’m trying to donate my company’s services to a worthy gay/lesbian/bisexual/transgender non-profit internet startup database company, and Theodore is trying to convince me not to, so as to preserve his lifestyle of excessive consumer consumption and season tickets to the opera.”

Blake laughed, and Ted shook his head. “Don’t joke about opera tickets.”

I ran my hand through my hair. “Are we done?”

Ted hesitated. “Not really. Do you want to come back to this tomorrow? We have a pretty full day.”

“Remind me again why I wanted to own my own company?”

“Two companies, three if this real estate thing goes through.”

“Remind me again why I wanted to own two, possibly three, companies?”

“I think it’s the money.”

I nodded. “That’s right, I’m a shallow, materialistic shit.”

Ted looked thoughtful. “I find that comforting, somehow.”

“Oddly, Theodore, so do I.”

Ted walked Blake out, and I got up and poured myself a scotch from the bar in the office. I still sometimes hesitated to drink in front of Ted, ostensibly to support his life of sobriety, but in reality because he liked to get me drunk and pry information out of me about my personal life.

Three hours later, we’d structured a deal that we thought would work for both the new company and Kinnetik. I stood up and stretched, and squeezed the back of my neck. I was starting to get a headache, and I needed a cigarette. I walked over to my desk, and then looked up at the high windows.

“It’s still raining.”

Ted glanced over, and nodded. “Drive home carefully, you wouldn’t want to damage the ‘vette. Or, you know, yourself.”

I shook my head. “Justin’s in New York, I’ll just stay at the loft tonight.”

Ted looked like he was about to say something, and I raised my eyebrow while I poured a drink.

He shook his head. “I know if I ask if you want to go to the diner or even come to the house, I’ll just get a sarcastic dissertation on how you can get along fine with Justin being out of town.”

I took my drink over to the sofa and leaned back and closed my eyes. “Do you really think I can’t stand him being away for a couple of nights? Just because I finally fell in love doesn’t mean I’ve turned into a complete pussy.”

Ted sat down. “I don’t think I’ve ever heard you say that word before.”

”What, pussy?”

“Love.”

I drank the last of the scotch in my glass. “Don’t you have a husband to get home to?”

Ted took the hint and stood up. “I’ll see you tomorrow, hopefully we’ll have doubled Kinnetik’s square footage, not to mention its overhead and debt load, by the end of the week.”

I frowned. “There must be a better way to phrase that.”

Ted laughed. “Goodnight, Brian.”

**Justin’s POV**

I was sitting on Kalli’s sofa, sketching. She was in her bedroom, trying on black skirts.

She walked in, wearing black boots and a short black skirt. “Well?”

I looked at her appraisingly. “Did you mean to look like a hooker?”

She frowned at me and went back to her room. I went back to my sketchpad.

An hour later, we were heading down the stairs of her building. She was wearing a black silk trench coat over a knee-length black skirt, and a pair of black pumps. We were meeting some people from the collective at a diner around the corner, and then going to the opening at the gallery. I’d checked out of my hotel and left my bag and laptop at her place.

I rotated my hand and flexed it backwards while we walked down the block. Kalli slanted her eyes at me.

“How is it?”

I shrugged. “Fine, unless I draw something.”

“Well, good thing you’re not an artist or anything.”

“Yeah, it really is.”

“You should stop drawing the comic and focus on your art.”

I laughed a little. “You sound like Brian.”

We were a little late and everyone was already eating. I ordered a burger and coffee, and Kalli got what she always got at diners, breakfast. Kalli introduced me to the only two people there I didn’t know, a sculptor named Rick who’d taken over my old space, and a performance artist/videographer named Jen. We were arguing over the artistic merits of combining performance art with visual art when my cell phone rang. It was Brian, so I turned away slightly and answered it. “Hey.”

“Hey.”

I heard sounds in the background, noises from his computer and papers rustling. “You’re at the office?”

“Yeah, we have a big presentation tomorrow, and I’m still breaking in this new art director Cynthia found.”

I smiled. “Your art department is all totally traumatized by you. You should just stay away from them.”

He sounded amused. “You can’t coddle the artists, the next thing you know, they think they’re indispensable.”

“So, what did they do now?”

“Tell me, Justin, in your intermittent attendance at PIFA, between interludes of recreational drug use, sex, social activism, and destroying the internship program, did anyone ever attempt to teach you anything about perspective and proportion?”

I smiled. “I vaguely recall something about that.”

“I think my entire art department was absent that day. I have a graphic here from one of them, in which, if the figure in it unfolded his arms, they’d reach his knees.”

“Are you sure that’s not a form of artistic expression?”

Brian snorted. “Ape art?”

I smiled again, then bit my lip. “I should go, we’re eating.”

“Somewhere glamorous, I hope.” I heard his computer shutting down.

“A greasy diner, actually.”

He laughed. “Why am I not surprised? Tell Kalli I said hi.”

“Later.”

“Later.”

I turned back towards the table, and realized everyone was staring at me and no one was talking. I felt my face get hot. “What?”

Rick laughed. “You should see your face.”

“You should see the guy who put that look on his face.” It was Kalli, laughing at me. “How’s Brian?”

“He said hi.” I took a sip of my coffee, but it was cold.

Kalli switched into her gallery persona the minute we went through the door, and after saying hello to Armand, I wandered around looking at the installation. I’d wanted to see this artist, because he was working on transparent sheets of fiberglass with emulsified acrylic paint, and I was curious about it. They were hung slightly out from the wall, so light came up behind them.

I was sipping a glass of wine and staring at a predominantly burgundy painting.

“Justin?”

I turned, and then looked down. “Adrienne?”

Adrienne Bennett smiled up at me from her wheelchair. “Lindsay told me you’d be here, and I’d been wanting to see these, so I thought I’d come tonight.”

I squatted down next to her. “Are you living in New York now?”

“I lead a bit of a nomadic lifestyle, spend part of the year here, part in the Pitts, part in Europe or wherever I feel like going. Life’s too short to be where you don’t want to be.”

 “Yeah, I’m figuring that out myself. I lived here for a while, but I’m back in Pittsburgh now.”

“And so is Lindsay. For a less-than-world-class town, it seems to have its own peculiar gravitational pull.” She laughed a little. “So, Lindsay also said you were looking for an agent. I think that’s the right next move for you. I’ve seen your work here, it’s extremely impressive.”

I couldn’t keep from smiling. “Thanks. I saw a show you did here last year, but they said you were in Africa.”

“Ah, yes, my safari phase. That’s out of my system now.”

“Good. Sounds dangerous.”

She grinned at me. “Photo safari.”

We moved to a bench so I could sit while we talked, and after a little while Armand came over to us.

“Adrienne, lovely to see you here, thanks for coming. I see you’ve met Justin?”

Adrienne smiled at him. “Justin and I are old friends.”

He looked surprised. “You are? That’s right, you’re originally from Pittsburgh, too, aren’t you?”

“I still call it home, as much as I call anywhere home these days.”

I sat there quietly while Armand and Adrienne chatted, and then he asked if we’d met the artist. He left, saying he’d bring him back to meet us.

Adrienne looked at me for a few minutes. “So, how’s the hand?”

“As long as I pace myself, I’m pretty much okay.”

“And you don’t feel like complaining to me, because I’m so much worse off than you, but I manage to soldier on and make everyone admire my tremendous courage and nobility of spirit?”

I looked at her, and realized she was laughing at me. “Something like that.”

She sighed. “Be as pissed off as you want to be, kid. It’s not a competition. My car crash doesn’t trump some guy hitting you in the head with a bat and screwing up the rest of your life, and my wheelchair doesn’t mean you don’t get to piss and moan about your hand. Just as long as you keep working, the rest is a waste of time.”

I didn’t answer her right away. “I’m completely pissed off and I hate it, and there isn’t one single day I don’t hit some kind of wall where I want to do something that I can’t do with my art because of my hand.”

Adrienne smiled. “Much better. Now, give me a shove over to the buffet table, I need some food and another drink before I have to make nice with this artist.”

Adrienne left about an hour later, and Kalli swooped down on me and introduced me to someone she thought I should meet. I felt the muscles in my face getting sore from too much smiling. It almost felt like being back at the diner.

At around 11, things were winding down, and I found Kalli to say goodnight.

She kissed my cheek, still firmly in her power gallery mode. “Are you sure you need to go tonight? Why don’t you go home in the morning? My air conditioning’s working now.”

I shook my head. “Brian’s leaving tomorrow morning for the rest of the week, I want to see him before he goes.”

She slipped me an extra key to her place, and I kept the cab waiting while I grabbed my bag and my laptop and ran back down the stairs. I didn’t even want to think about how much this cab ride was costing.

I got into Pittsburgh at 2, and by the time the car service picked me up and got me out to the house, it was past 3. Brian had taken advantage of my absence to turn the air conditioning down to minus twelve, and I was shivering with cold and a desperate need for sleep by the time I got upstairs. I set my bag down by the closet door, stripped off my clothes and shoes, dug an old, stretched out, faded blue turtleneck sweater out of my drawer, and climbed into bed while I pulled it on.

Brian rolled over and wrapped himself around me, then lifted his head up and looked at me, confused.

“Why the fuck are you wearing a sweater in bed?”

“I’m cold.”

He slid his hands up under the sweater and pulled it off over my head, and then tugged me in close to his chest and wrapped his arms around me. “Keeping you warm is my job.”

I smiled and sighed against his shoulder. “I love you.”

He kissed my hair. “I know. That’s your job.”

I laughed and jabbed him with my elbow. “Asshole.”

“And yet, you love me.”

I kissed his throat. “It’s true. I do.”

His hands felt big and warm on my back, and his voice was low. “I love you, too.”

I lay there inside his arms, listening to his breathing slow down, feeling his heart beating, the warmth of his body spreading around me under the duvet. And after a few minutes, I fell asleep.

**Brian’s POV**

I didn’t want to wake Justin up that morning when the alarm went off, but even if it was the most lesbianic thing I ever did, I wasn’t going the rest of the week without fucking him. I was lightly kissing his eyes when they started to open. He smiled. “Hey.”

I nuzzled his cheek. “Hey yourself.”

Justin kissed me. “We should have just met at an airport hotel.”

I laughed. “You’re probably right.” I went back to kissing his eyes, and he made a sleepy purring sound. He shifted against me, and I moved on top of him while his legs wrapped around me and his arms went around my neck. I kept the duvet over our shoulders and he smiled and pulled it over our heads, and I laughed and pushed it back down with one hand. He pulled my head in close and kissed me.

I closed my eyes while I went into him, and I felt his hand on my hair, pushing it off my forehead. I opened my eyes and looked at him, and he smiled.

I kept my eyes open and pushed in a little more, and he opened up underneath me, and I groaned as I went all the way in with one more thrust. His hand was on my face again, tracing my eyelashes, touching my lips.

And then he smiled. Just a small smile, but I had to kiss it, touch it with my tongue, feel its shape under my own lips. And then his hand again, softly touching my cheek, resting on my neck, tracing the curves of my ear.

I barely made my flight, and Cynthia was sitting in the aisle seat reading a magazine, pretending not to see me.

“I’m pretty sure it’s a violation of some kind of FAA regulation for you to sit in a seat other than the one on your boarding pass.”

She didn’t even lift her eyes from the pages of _Vanity Fair_. “Really? I thought you must be one of the standby passengers, since it was pretty clear that the guy whose seat this was supposed to be missed the flight.”

“I’m doing this on one cup of coffee, Cynthia, so I’d suggest you just move.”

“That’s frightening.” She shifted to the window seat, and then looked at me appraisingly. “Should I ring for emergency caffeine?”

I dropped into the seat and leaned my head against the back. “Just have them syringe it in while I sleep.”

We spent the day in LA meeting with two prospective clients, and the next morning, Cynthia headed back to the office and I went to Washington to meet with Lawrence Remson.

I had a plausible reason to meet with him. He’d been trying to get his new drug through the FDA process, and the last meeting with his attorneys had pretty much bagged most of the wording from the campaign we’d originally designed. But the truth was, there were other people I could have sent to handle that.

When I got to Washington, I turned my cell back on, and stopped and got a drink at an airport bar before going to the hotel. Too much sparkling water and iced tea in LA.

I was heading outside to meet my car, when my cell phone rang. That hadn’t taken long.

“Hey.”

“Hey.” I could hear Justin’s music in the background. “Where are you?”

I saw my driver, and handed him my bag and followed him to the car. “I just got off the plane in DC.”

“So, not a good time to ask what you’re wearing?”

I smirked as I got in the back of the car. “Good to see you learn from your mistakes.” I heard the trunk slam, and then the driver got in and pulled out into traffic.

“Michael came over today, we worked on Rage for a while.”

“How’s your hand?”

“Same as usual. I didn’t push it.”

“How’s Michael?”

“He’s good.”

Another one of those silences that make me love phone conversations so much. “So…”

“Yeah.”

I waited.

“I miss you.”

I smiled. “Me too.”

“Later.”

“Later.”

My appointment with Remson was first thing the next morning. After we hashed over the language for the ad again, I sat back in my chair and paused for a minute.

“Trying to think how to hit me up for more support for one of your projects?” He looked resigned.

I smiled. “No, Theodore assures me the foundation is amply funded.” Remson and Kinnetik were jointly underwriting the hospice. “This is personal.”

He looked surprised. “What can I do for you?”

“I have a friend who has HIV, and he’s had recurrent therapy failures and interruptions due to chronic pancreatitis.”

Before I finished talking, Remson was nodding. “You want to get him on the trial protocol.”

“Yes.” I hoped Remson was in the mood for the direct approach.

“Did he apply?”

“He was rejected for the study because he was in Pittsburgh. His doctor suggested he look into Treatment Investigational New Drug access. I was hoping you could facilitate that.”

“This is a good friend?”

“The partner of my best friend.”

“What regimens has he failed on?” Remson had opened his laptop and was typing while he asked me questions.

“ddI when the pancreatitis was first diagnosed, but he’s been on Hydrea and Combivir in the past.”

“Great, a recipe for pancreatic problems.”

“Apparently.”

He asked me a few more questions, typing while I answered. He printed something out and handed it to me. “Have his doctor call. As long as there’s no medical reason to deny him, he can get access.”

I glanced at the paper in my hand. “He’s not sick.” I’d done my research, TIND was usually reserved for people who were seriously ill and had no other options.

Remson shook his head. “Yes, he is. Chronic pancreatitis, HIV, three failed drug combinations accompanied by repeated bouts of high viral load and low t-cells when off his meds? He’s sick.”

I didn’t answer.

“Brian, odds are he’ll be fine, but this is a serious treatment issue. It’s one of the reasons I want to get approval for this new protocol. What good is having all these great drugs to make HIV manageable, if the patients can’t manage to take the drugs?”

I shook his hand and thanked him and went downstairs, and sat in the lobby of his Washington office building and stared out the glass doors at the street outside. I wasn’t really sure how long I’d been sitting there when I finally got out my phone and called Michael.

“Brian. Did you ask him?”

“Yeah, he gave me the contact information for Ben’s doctor, he said it should be no problem.”

I heard Michael give a sigh of relief. “Good, great, thank you…”

“Yeah. Shut up.”

“I can thank you.”

I sighed. “Buy me something expensive.”

Michael laughed. “What can I buy you that you don’t already have ten of?”

“Good point.”

"Hang on." I heard the cash register in the background and him thanking someone, then he came back on the line. “So, when do you come home?”

“I’m going to Chicago first, and then I’ll be home on Friday.”

“In time for the party?” The Rage release party was on Saturday.

“I wouldn’t dream of missing it, you know how I live for these events.”

He laughed. “You sound like Justin.”

That made me smile. “Hey, I have to go.”

“Okay, and Brian, I’ll shut up forever now, but thank you.” And he hung up.

**Justin’s POV**

I squinted at the sunshine glaring off the surface of the pool.

“Justin has a great ass and perfect hair, but he’s like a vampire, he can’t let the sunlight touch his skin.” Daphne sounded smug.

Alfe glanced over to where I was sitting curled up on a lounge chair in the shade, clutching a cup of coffee, and back at Daphne. “What’s wrong with your hair?”

We both burst out laughing, and Daphne smacked at his arm. “Nothing’s wrong with my hair, my hair is perfect! What about my ass, you asshole?”

Alfe used his feet to splash water at Daphne, who was sitting next to him on the edge of the pool. “I’m aware that there’s no way to dig myself out of this.”

“Morning.” It was Brian, wearing a pair of baggy sweats. “Justin, there’s no coffee.”

I sighed. “It’s in the thermos. Sit down, I’ll get it.”

He looked bewildered, so I got up and pushed him into a chair. “Sit. Wait. Coffee.”

He crossed his arms on the table and buried his head in them.

When I got back, Daphne and Alfe were swimming, and Brian was right where I’d left him, the sun shining on the muscles of his back. I felt like drawing him, or fucking him, but I put the mug down on the table, and knelt next to his chair. “Why don’t you go back to bed?”

He sighed. “Mmmm. We have company.”

I patted his shoulder. “I can entertain them. We have a party tonight, you should sleep some more.”

He groaned. “Rage party.”

I nodded. “I know. But Michael wants us to go, so we’re going.”

He sipped his coffee and glared at the liquid in the cup. “I’ve never liked Michael. He’s a very bad influence on me.”

“I know. Drink your coffee. Then go back to bed.”

Brian was too tired to argue, and I promised to wake him up in an hour. He looked at me accusingly.

“You won’t, though. I’ll wake up an hour before the party, with the drapes drawn and the clock missing.”

“Most likely.”

He went inside anyway, and Alfe looked at me. “You guys really do have a weird relationship.”

Daphne laughed. “I told you.”

“You did. And I believed you. Mostly.”

“And I haven’t even told you the really freaky stuff.” Daphne pulled herself out of the pool and lay down on a lounge chair. “God, I wish the summer wasn’t over.”

I looked at her. “It’s only the end of August.”

She made a face. “I went back to school this week.”

I laughed. “I’m sorry. Higher education bites, doesn’t it.”

“Dropout.”

“Intellectual elitist.”

Alfe stared from the pool. “You two are exhausting.”

Daphne ignored that. “We should set up a time for you to be interviewed for my thesis.”

I nodded. “Okay.”

Alfe got out of the water, picked up a towel and dried off, and then came and sat next to Daphne. “I have a feeling once she starts writing that thing, I’ll cease to exist.”

Daphne smiled at him and patted his arm. “Not as long as you bring me food and drag me out dancing now and then.”

I laughed. “That sounds sort of like the Justin Taylor relationship manual.”

“Fast foods and clubbing. The Justin Taylor teen years.”

Alfe shook his head.  “I can’t believe the two of you used to go to Babylon when you were in high school.”

“It was mostly Justin.”

“Yeah, but you would have loved her Judy Jetson look. It was hot.”

Daphne threw a pillow at me, which I took as a sign of victory. She must have, too, because she changed the subject.

“So, should I give up on Brian talking to me for my thesis?”

“Yes.”

“That was short and sweet.”

“You asked.”

She rolled her eyes. “You sound like him.”

I shrugged.

“Your mom’s going to talk to me.”

I groaned. “Jesus, Daphne.” I’d had a feeling that was going to happen, after I saw them talking together at the party. “Who else, the head of St. James? Hobbes?”

She looked at me strangely. “I did ask the board at St. James to let someone talk to me. They’re considering it. It’s about public health issues, Justin… it’s about the systems’ failures, and their impact on society. And no, I’m not fucking going to talk to Hobbes. I’d probably strangle him with the microphone cord.”

“You have a wireless mic, and I don’t recommend violent retribution. It’s not the relief you think it’s gonna be.”

“Yeah. I know.”

I remembered Alfe was there, but he was looking at the pool and pretending not to listen. I was glad Brian had gone back to bed. And I decided it was my turn to change the subject.

“So, are you two coming to the party tonight?”

Daphne nodded. “Yeah, we’ll be there. Alfe has to work at Babylon so we’ll be there early.”

They left after lunch, and I went into the studio and worked for a few hours. I painted steadily for a while, then worked on Rage until my hand started to cramp.

I went upstairs, and sat on the edge of the bed looking at Brian. He was sleeping so deeply I hated to wake him, but it was getting late. So I rested my hand on his bare shoulder and started to stroke down his back.

At first he didn’t respond, but I made my touch a little firmer, and he opened his eyes and looked at me. I blinked and smiled, and leaned down and touched my nose to his, and he reached up and pulled me down, and kissed me.

 “What time is it?” His voice was rough.

“It’s 4:30.”

“Shit.”

“We have time, the party’s not until 8.”

“I know, but I want to fuck you.”

I smiled. “I told you, we have time.”

I nudged him with my hand, and he pulled me backwards into his arms and reached around me, and started massaging my hand.

He sighed. “I really don’t want to go tonight.”

“I know. Neither do I.”

“How come we do so much shit we don’t want to do?” He was working the muscle at the base of my thumb. It felt good.

I shook my head. “No idea.” I turned around and kissed him, running my hands through his spiky, messy hair and breathing in his smell. I smoothed my hand down his side, under the blankets, and around the curve of his ass.

“You’re feeling lucky.” I looked at his face, and he had a little smile on his lips.

I sighed and buried my face in his neck. “I don’t care what we do.”

Brian rolled me over and looked at me, his hand in my hair. “Hey. What’s wrong?”

I shook my head, and pushed my head against his hand.

I heard him huff a little sigh. “Don’t think about it.”

I looked up at him. “Don’t think about what?”

 His voice was rough and quiet. “Anything that would make you feel that way.”

I laughed a little. “Does that work?”

“Sometimes.”

“And when it doesn’t?”

Brian smiled at me, but he didn’t look happy. “Then, Justin, you’re completely fucked.” And he bent his face down, and kissed me.

When he started to kiss my neck and shoulders, I turned in his arms, and let his mouth trail down my back. His tongue was tracing my spine, and his hands were gently stroking my ass and the backs of my thighs. I let him push my thighs apart, his tongue and wet fingers playing at my asshole.

I tried to push towards his mouth, but he let the weight of his shoulders keep me flat on the bed. His hands were holding my cheeks apart, and I could feel the stubble on his face against my skin while his hot tongue snaked into me. When he slid a finger in alongside his tongue I knew he was going to fuck me, and I wanted it so much that I gave a little cry, muffled in the pillow and my arms.

I felt him pull his head away while his finger stroked inside me, and then he reached across me for the lube. He still didn’t let me get up on my knees, pressing against me with his cock, his knees on the outside of mine, keeping them from spreading.

He dropped his head down onto my back and moaned hard when he slid into me. It felt tight, almost too tight, and I tried to move but he held me still and I heard myself whimpering. I pulled his hand underneath me and he let me lift up a little bit, and I started to stroke myself against his lubed palm, biting on my lip and feeling his weight on my back.

When he came he bit me where my neck and shoulder met. I gripped his wrist and started to come, too, jerking against his hand. He pulled out of me and buried his face in my ass, licking my thighs and my hole, finally letting me lift myself up and open myself up to him.

I was lying with my head on his chest, tracing my finger on the outline of his abdominal muscles. “We should shower.”

He kissed my hair. “Mmm hmmmm.”

I smiled and kissed his chest, and then got out of bed. When the shower was hot, he appeared behind me, and we washed each other’s hair and backs and stood there under the water for a long time.

“You know…”

He looked at me with one eyebrow raised.

“At the loft, we always knew we’d been in here too long because we ran out of hot water.”

He smiled. “Well, eventually we’d run out of hot water here, too.”

“I love this house.”

Brian didn’t say anything at first, and then he kissed me. “Me, too.”

Usually, Brian sex therapy was all I needed to feel happy again, but I still couldn’t shake my mood as we parked near Red Cape. Brian frowned at me while he locked the car. “We really don’t have to go.”

“We really do.”

“Is your hand bothering you?” He sounded frustrated.

I shook my head, and looked away from him.

He surprised me by walking over to my side of the car and backing me into it, his arms on either side of me. I leaned back, and let him press his forehead against mine.

“Justin. What the fuck?”

 “You know, I hate it when you decide it’s time to talk.”

 “Welcome to my world.”

I stood and looked at him for a long time, then shrugged.

Brian smirked and stepped back from the car. “That’s my line.”

I started walking towards the store, and Brian grabbed my arm from behind me. “Justin. I’m serious.”

“You want to talk. I get it.” I turned around and looked at him. “What?”

He ran his hand through his hair, and then sighed. I just kept looking at him, and finally he looked away and we went to the party.

When we got there, Melanie was standing with Michael by a life-sized cardboard figure of Rage, flipping through the new issue. I heard her burst out laughing, and Brian raised an eyebrow at her.

“Fuck, Brian, what are they trying to do to you?”

“I’m not Rage.”

Mel rolled her eyes. “Right. I forgot. So, Michael, how are you and Justin getting him out of this one?”

Michael grinned at her. “We’ll never tell.”

Brian looked down at me and frowned. “Promise me you have a plan.”

Michael laughed. “Sure, we have a plan. Tell him, Justin.”

I shook my head. “You’re in charge of the plot, I just draw.”

“Yeah. Right. You’re such a good obedient little artist, you never have any opinions on anything.”

Brian squeezed my shoulder. “That’s Justin. Obedient and no opinions.”

I saw Emmett standing with Ted and Blake, and made a detour past the food before going over to join them. I gave Emmett a quizzical look as I ate a crab puff, suspecting Brian had augmented the budget Michael and I had given him. I was fairly sure crab and champagne weren’t on Emmett’s bargain menu.

“Sweetie, you know how Brian is. He’s an unstoppable force. I never even try to resist.”

Ted laughed. “Don’t waste your breath on Justin, he wrote the book on unstoppable forces meeting immovable objects.”

I smiled. “Yeah, I did. You just have to be really firm with Brian.”

Emmett looked at me curiously. “Why, though?”

I felt hands on my shoulder, and tipped my head back. It was Brian. “Having fun, girls?”

I flicked my foot backwards at his shin. “Behave.”

He looked around. “Why? Eli and Monty aren’t here.”

“Yet.” It was Ted, darkly.

I looked at him. “Are they coming?”

“So Mel told me. They asked them to watch the kids, and they said there were going to be here.”

Brian groaned. “Justin, really. Don’t you think it’s time we left?”

I turned around and looked at him. “I didn’t even want to come in the first place.”

Blake looked surprised. “Why not?”

No one answered right away, and then Emmett did. “Justin’s kind of superstitious about Rage release parties.”

Ted spoke up then, too. “Due to certain confluences of events that seem to schedule them around various catastrophic occurrences.”

Blake looked lost. “Such as….”

Ted and Emmett looked at each other, then at Brian and me, and then back at each other. “Never mind.”

“Wise answer.” It was Brian, his hands still on my shoulders.

“Hey!” It was Daphne, with a little sparkling mist of raindrops on her hair and face and clothes. I gave her a hug, and Brian pecked her on the cheek. “Sorry I’m late, we got stuck in traffic, there’s a huge accident downtown.”

Emmett nodded. “It’s the rain. Every time it rains, it’s like it’s never rained before, and people just skid all over the place.”

Brian snorted. “Amateurs.”

Daphne was bouncing up and down on her toes in a way I’d learned meant she wanted to tell me something extremely, critically important right away, so I let her pull me over to the quietest corner of the shop.

“So, where is it?”

“What?”

She rolled her eyes. “THE COMIC, stupid. I want to see it.”

I found her a copy and while she was reading it, Alfe came in, leaving his wet jacket with the others by the door.

He spotted us, and came over and kissed Daphne’s cheek. “So, is it good?”

“I don’t know yet. I’m still reading.” She turned a page.

I took Alfe over to get some food and a drink, and when we came back, Daphne was on the last page.

“That’s it? YOU ENDED IT THERE?” She swatted me with it. “You asshole. What happens next?”

I smiled at her. “Stay tuned.”

“That’s evil.”

I shrugged. “It sells comic books.”

“That’s REALLY evil.”

Alfe had taken it from her and was starting to read.

“He’s read all the ones before at my house.”

I laughed. “X-rated gay comic books, just what every guy likes to read at his girlfriend’s house.”

Alfe glanced at me, smiled, and went back to the story.

Daphne’s eyes got all dreamy. “Alfe is special.”

He didn’t lift his eyes from the comic, but he shifted it to his right hand and slid his left arm over Daphne’s shoulders.

Then I heard a familiar voice by the door. “Oh, fuck.”

“What?” Daphne looked confused.

“Eli and Monty.” I nodded towards the door.

She glanced over her shoulder, then back at me. “So?”

I’d scanned the room for Brian and didn’t see him. Maybe he’d gone out to smoke. “Never mind.”

Daphne and I left Alfe with Rage, and went and checked out the second wave of food Emmett was putting out. It involved brownies, so Daphne was happy.

She swallowed, and carefully licked a few crumbs of chocolate off the surface of her lip-gloss. “So, are you and Brian coming to Babylon tonight?”

I shrugged. “That’s the plan, but I’m kind of tired.”

She tipped her head to the side. “You look tired. Brian keep you up all night with hot reunion sex?”

I choked on a mouthful of brownie. “Daph.”

She rolled her eyes. “I forgot, you’re shy.” She got another brownie from the counter. “So seriously, tell me, how are you and Michael going to get Rage out of trouble? I won’t tell anyone.”

I smiled mysteriously. “We have a plan, but until we actually write it and draw it, anything can happen.”

“Good answer.” It was Michael. “Can I steal it? Hey, Daphne.”

“Hey, Michael. The story’s great, I’m just trying to get Justin to give me a little hint about the next issue. He’s being stubborn.”

Michael looked at me, then her, then back at me, and grinned. “Imagine that. Justin, stubborn.”

Alfe came up and congratulated us both, and he and Michael started talking about sales, marketing, and the Rage website. I still didn’t see any sign of Brian, and I wondered if he was still outside.

“Daph? If Brian’s looking for me, tell him I walked up to the diner, okay?”

“Sure. Alfe and I are going to have to head for Babylon soon, if you and Brian decide to go, come find me in the DJ booth, okay?

I hugged her goodbye and went outside.

  **Brian’s POV**

I was sitting on the sofa when Lindsay dropped down on one side of me, and Mel on the other. I groaned.

“To what do I owe this lesbianic invasion?”

“You’re on the only comfortable place to sit in the store?” It was Melanie, a plateful of cheese, crab, French bread, and pâté on her lap.

I heard a familiar voice and looked at the door. Mel groaned. “Fuck.”

Lindsay sighed and got up and went over to greet Eli and Monty. I looked at Mel, and reached down to the floor and handed her my bottle of scotch.

She took a good-sized swallow and backhanded her mouth before handing it back. “I’ve always said you’re not a total dick.”

“And I’ve always thought you weren’t as big a cunt as everyone says.”

Ben came over and gave Mel a kiss on the cheek. “So, how’s JR?”

“She’s fine, Lindsay found a sitter she really likes, since I thought Rage was a little NC-17 for two pre-schoolers.”

He sank down in Lindsay’s vacated spot next to me. “Brian, I want to thank you for…”

“No thanks needed, Professor.” I shifted slightly away from Mel and tried to use my powers of mind control to get him to shut up.

Ben didn’t say anything more, just clapped his hand on my shoulder and got up and left.

“What was that about?”

I reached over and took a crab puff off Melanie’s plate. “Nothing.”

“Michael will tell me.”

I shrugged. “Let him. Not my thing to tell.”

“You must have done something nice. Why else would you be trying to hide it?”

I smiled and took another drink from the bottle.

Just then I noticed Eli and Monty heading our way, so I grabbed the bottle and Mel’s hand, and pulled her into the back room of the store and barricaded the door. We slid down against the wall, laughing and passing the bottle back and forth.

Melanie took a bite of pâté-smeared bread. “I know it’s wrong, but every time I’m in their house, I want to use foul language and spray paint graffiti on their walls.”

“I’ll pay you good money if you do.” I took another drink from the bottle.

When we came out looking for more food, Lindsay was glaring so hard at Mel she apologetically slunk off. It was definitely time to leave the party, but when I looked around, I didn’t see Justin.

“Brian! Justin went to the diner, I think he thought you’d gone up there.” It was Daphne, on her way out the door with Alfe.

I followed them out, walked with them to their car, and then headed back towards the diner.

Justin was sitting on the bench under the awning in front, smoking a cigarette and staring at the rain. I sat down next to him and took it from his hand and took a drag. “I thought you’d quit, since your acupuncturist told you smoking narrows your blood vessels and restricts blood flow to your tissues and nerves.”

He took the cigarette back from me. “I thought you’d quit since you’ve had cancer and your father died of lung cancer.”

I took the cigarette back from him and tossed it out into the gutter. “Oh, yeah.” I looked at him for a minute. “You don’t seem in the mood to go dancing. Alfe’s playing tonight.”

“I know.” He kept staring at the wet street.

I stood up and held out my hand. “Let’s go home.”

He looked up at me. “Do you want to go to the loft?”

I thought about it for a minute. “Do you?”

He took my hand and stood up, and kicked at the sidewalk with his foot. “I don’t know.”

I let go of his hand and squeezed the back of my neck. I was getting a headache. “Give me a clue. Am I missing something?”

He was quiet for a minute and then he sat back down again. I was getting tired of bouncing all over, but I sat down next to him. “Justin.”

He sighed, and turned towards me, burying his face in my shoulder. “I don’t know what’s wrong, Brian. I’m just, I don’t know…”

I put my arm around him, but I didn’t say anything right away. I felt a lot of conflicting impulses, to ask him if it was something I did or said, or something that had happened when I was gone, but I just sat on the bench, holding him.

After a little while I felt him relax. He turned his head into my neck and whispered so I had to bend my head to hear him. “It’s not you.”

I wrapped my arms tighter around him, and we sat there for a while, waiting for a break in the rain.

When we got home we went to bed. Justin fell asleep before I did. I lay there for a long time, stroking his hair and staring at the ceiling. I finally closed my eyes.

I woke up suddenly. Justin was on the other side of the bed, and he was making noise in his sleep, and he jerked his right arm sharply. I sat up and looked at him, and said his name. “Justin.”

He didn’t wake up, just made a choked sound. I took a breath and put my hand firmly on his bare shoulder. “Justin.”

Sometimes when I touched him when he was having a nightmare he would hit at me before waking up, so I’d learned to touch and then get out of the way. I grabbed his wrist. “Justin.”

This time he opened his eyes, although it was a few seconds before they focused. His forehead was beaded with sweat, but he had goosebumps on his arms.

He sat up. “Fuck.”

I turned on the bedside lamp. “It’s been a while.”

He nodded. He still looked kind of dazed.

I slid closer to him and pulled him into my arms. He resisted for a second, but I pulled the duvet up over our shoulders and he let out a deep breath and relaxed. I tucked his head under my chin. “Same old thing?”

He shook his head. “Different.”

“What was it?”

He didn’t answer right away. “I’d been in New York, and I came home and was looking for you, but no one would tell me where you were. I looked for you and couldn’t find you, and then I knew you’d died of cancer but no one would tell me. And I was wandering all around Pittsburgh trying to get someone to tell me. But no one would.”

I just lay there for a while, and then I kissed him gently on his head. “I’m right here, Justin. And I’m fine.”

“I know.” His hand was on my chest, right over my heart. I thought about all the times I’d felt his hand resting there, or that he’d rested his head on my chest with his ear pressed there. I sighed.

Justin lifted his head and put his hands on either side of my face. He kissed me slowly and gently, his tongue soft inside my mouth.

I pulled away from the kiss and whispered into his ear. “What do you want, Justin? Tell me what you want.” I could hear the rain beating down on the roof.

His mouth was against my jaw. “I want you inside me. Brian, Brian…” He was thrusting up against my hip. I smiled and he started to turn in my arms while I reached over him to get the lube.

I stopped him and knelt between his legs. “This way. I want to see your face.”

I watched his eyes while I lubed his ass, and then put lube in his palm and held his hand in both of mine while I slowly stroked my cock against it. He was biting his lip, and his face was flushed.

I kept watching his eyes while I pressed into him. I never paused, but I went in so slowly it seemed to last forever, and he never closed his eyes or looked away. I felt heat wash over me, my chest and face and arms, and I almost felt like I couldn’t breathe.

I finally stopped going into him, and just held myself still, feeling him tight and hot on my cock. I didn’t move, not a muscle, and after a minute he gripped at me with his ass, and reached for my wrists, and made a sound, a cross between a moan and a breath. I started to fuck him then, but shallowly, never pulling out too far and never pushing in too deep, prodding at his prostate. I moved my hands so I was gripping his wrists, and his legs were up around my waist, and his heels were digging into my back.

“Brian…” his voice sounded choked, but I ignored it and just kept moving on that one spot inside him. I knew what it felt like, to have the pressure never let up, never stop, and I knew he was feeling like he was going to fly apart when he came. And he was.

He was lifting his hips up and his legs tightened around me, and I shifted more of my weight forward to hold down his hands. He said my name again, and then again, and then I saw his chest get blotchy and red and I smiled.

“Do you like that, Justin?” I was stroking against him, inside him, and he kept his eyes on mine and nodded, and bit his lip, and I kept moving. His breath was coming in shallow gasps and he tried to get his hands away again, and I didn’t stop and I didn’t let him go. I wanted to make him come like this, I wanted him to explode from inside.

He started to say my name again but he couldn’t even get it out, just moaned and tightened his legs around me even more. I gritted my teeth against my own orgasm, and willed it back.

“Justin…. I love fucking you bare like this, I love feeling it.” He gave another gasp and I almost smiled, but instead I leaned down close to him and pressed my mouth against his throat. “I love knowing I’m going to come inside your ass and you’re going to be full of my come…”

His legs jerked on me and his heels pressed painfully into me, and he actually got one of his hands free and grabbed the back of my neck. I could feel his throat straining against my lips, and he arched his back and I felt him start to just dissolve all around me, every muscle in his thighs and arms going rigid and then giving out, while his orgasm washed over him.

His legs had fallen off my back and were lying on either side of me, and he was still shaking underneath me when I started to come. I let myself go, flooding into him, my hands gripping his hair and my weight on my elbows. I choked out his name and finally knelt there breathing hard, covered in sweat and Justin’s come, listening to the rain.


	3. Risks, Chapter 3

  
  
**Risks, Chapter 3  
** By Xie

“ _Risk! Risk anything! Care no more for the opinions of others, for those voices. Do the hardest thing on earth for you. Act for yourself. Face the truth._ ” -Katherine Mansfield

**Brian’s POV**

It took me a minute to remember what day it was. I wasn’t sure if it was Sunday, or if I’d just woken up before the alarm went off. A few more brain cells activated and it came back to me. Sunday.

Justin was sleeping, and I got out of bed and went into the bathroom. When I came out, I started to go downstairs, but got back in bed instead, and curled around him. He didn’t wake up, just shifted until his head was on my arm and his legs were tangled with mine. I fell back to sleep.

The second time I woke up, Justin was sitting on the edge of the bed, holding a mug of coffee near my face. I sat up and leaned back against the pillows behind me, and took the cup from him.

“What time is it?”

“Almost noon.”

“Fuck.” I blew on the surface of the coffee, and then took a sip. “How long have you been up?”

He took my coffee and drank some, and then set it on the bedside table and slid back under the duvet next to me. “Just long enough to make coffee.”

I slipped my hand under his sweatpants and let it rest on the curve of his ass, my head on the pillow, his resting on my shoulder. “A day off. I don’t even remember what those are like.” I was leaving Tuesday for a four-day business trip, and hadn’t planned on spending my one free day this week sleeping.

Justin just kissed my shoulder and didn’t say anything. I glanced down at him, and he was staring at the wall.

“Did you sleep okay?” I was surprised at how gentle my voice sounded.

He stirred a little against me. “Better the second time.”

I reached across him for the coffee. “Do you have to work today?”

“No.”

I didn’t say anything. I knew he probably did, but if he wanted to take a day off, I wasn’t going to complain. He’d been wound tight enough to snap the day before, and no matter what he said, he’d slept for shit. He never slept well after a nightmare.

I finished the coffee and put the cup back down. “Is it still raining?”

“Yeah.”

I kissed the top of his head. “Too bad, I wanted to swim today.”

“It’s not cold, just raining. You can swim.”

“But I can’t work on my tan.”

He finally smiled, but he didn’t say anything. I lay there trying to get the energy to get up and get more coffee, feeling frustrated.

It wasn’t that I didn’t have any idea what was wrong with Justin. It’s that usually, Justin knew what was wrong with Justin, and right now, I had a feeling he didn’t. I had no fucking idea what to do about it, though, since he’d decided he didn’t want to talk. I always had an urge to check on the continuing existence of gravity when that happened.

I’d tried fucking him, bullying him, and cuddling him. It was time for the big guns.

“Justin?”

He opened his eyes. “Hmmm?”

“Get up, we’re going out to eat.”

We went to the diner and I stuffed him with pancakes and donuts and bacon and eggs, and after a while he sat back in the corner of the booth and looked at me.

“Is this Michael Novotny junk food therapy?” The corner of his mouth was twitching in a smile.

I shook my head and grabbed a piece of syrup-soaked bacon off his plate and ate it. “How can you even suggest the Liberty Diner would serve junk food? This is the haute cuisine of America, the diner breakfast.” I licked a little trickle of syrup off my lip, and then leaned over and licked some off Justin’s lip, too.

“Is this a haute cuisine, diner breakfast version of Michael Novotny junk food therapy?” Justin could be a persistent little shit, but at least he was laughing.

“Well, my usual Justin Taylor sex therapy didn’t work, so I had to get creative.” I held my coffee cup up for a refill, and Debbie snapped her gum at me from the other side of the counter.

“Feel free to help yourself, hon.”

Justin laughed at the look on my face. “I’ll get it.”

I sighed and got up. “No, let’s not re-live the glorious days of your career as a busboy. I’ll get it.” I went and got the pot and refilled both our cups, and just then Emmett and Ted slid into the booth across from us, and turned their mugs over.

I looked at Ted, then Emmett, then back to Ted again, put the coffee pot down on the table, and sat back down next to Justin.

Emmett picked up the pot and filled his cup, then Ted’s. “So, boys, what brings you out of your suburban paradise and onto these mean streets?”

Justin took a sip of his coffee. “Breakfast.”

Emmett nodded sympathetically. “Yeah, must be hard living in that house with no kitchen and no money for groceries.”

I flicked my fingernail against Emmett’s hand where it was wrapped around his coffee cup.

Justin changed the subject. “So, where’s Blake?”

Ted set his cup down. “He’s got a group, we’re meeting him here.”

Emmett brightened. “The party last night went really well. No tragedies, disasters, divorces, or other catastrophes.”

Ted added a little sweetener to his coffee. “And the food was, as always, perfect.”

“Thank you, honey.” Emmett beamed at Ted and gave him a little peck on the cheek.

I rolled my eyes. “Yeah, and the comic was great. Right?”

“Absolutely.” It was Ted, looking suitably chastened.

Emmett looked at Justin. “I loved it. I can’t stand not knowing what’s gonna happen, though, Justin, do you swear you can’t give me just a little hint? I’ll never tell a soul.”

I snorted, but Justin just smiled and shook his head. “Michael and I have a plan, but until it’s written and drawn, everything is subject to change.”

Ted frowned. “That sounds familiar. Isn’t that the line Michael blew us off with last night?”

“Hey, guys.” It was Blake. He leaned down and kissed Ted’s cheek, and Ted and Emmett scooted over to make room for him. 

I noticed Justin was unusually quiet. I dropped my hand under the table and rested it on his right hand, and he turned his fingers up and entwined them with mine.

Debbie came over and retrieved her coffee pot, and took the new orders. I glanced at Justin, and he was looking blankly at his plate. I squeezed his hand a little, and he turned his head and looked at me, and smiled. He looked tired.

I realized Debbie was still standing there, and no one was talking.

“I said, can I get you two LOVEBIRDS anything else?” She managed to sound pleased and mocking at the same time.

I pulled a couple of bills out of my pocket and threw them on the table, and stood up abruptly, pulling Justin after me. “No, thanks, Deb, keep the change. Bye, everyone.”

Justin stumbled a little as I headed for the door, his hand still gripped in mine. “Brian, what the fuck… that was rude.”

I shoved the door open with my shoulder and started walking towards the car. I let go of his hand and lit a cigarette. He shook his head when I offered it to him, and I took one drag and threw it in the street.

“Justin. Have you told Michael you’re not drawing Rage?”

Justin stopped walking, and I stopped, too, and turned around to look at him.

He just looked at my face for a long time, and I waited. He blinked and sighed. “No.”

I realized my neck and shoulders had been tense all morning, because suddenly the tension drained away.

Justin started to walk towards the car again, and this time I was following him.

He glanced at me when I caught up. “How did you know?”

I shrugged. “Your hand. It hasn’t been fucked up for a while.” I took a breath. “And last night. I couldn’t make anything else make sense, about why you didn’t want to go to the party.”

He snorted. “Yeah, because otherwise I love Rage parties.”

I grabbed his arm, and he stopped and faced me. This was why I hated discussing our relationship. I had no idea how to do it.

I must have looked frustrated, because his face softened and he stepped into me. My arms went around him before I realized what I was doing. Maybe the secret was not talking, just letting my lips brush through his hair.

“I swear, Brian, I didn’t decide yet. I just… every time I went to do it, I ended up painting instead. Then last night, everyone was asking how soon the next issue was going to be out, and I just felt angry, but I didn’t know why.”

I kissed his hair. The last thing he sounded then was angry. “It’s okay, Justin.”

“It’s not okay.”

I hesitated. “You told him the show had to come first. He’ll understand.”

Justin nodded against me. “I know he will. I meant, it’s not okay with me.”

“You can do it after the show. It’s not that big a deal.”

He was quiet and then pulled back, and we walked towards the car. He still had his arm around my waist, and I had mine around his shoulders.

He started to say something, and I bent down so I could hear him. “It’s a big deal to me.”

**Justin’s POV**

When we got home from breakfast, I tried three times to write an email to Michael, and even tried to make myself call him, but I finally gave up and started painting. I wandered out to the kitchen and ate some cold pizza around 9, and Brian came in and said goodnight just after midnight. I told him I’d be up in a little while, and went back to the piece I was working on.

Some time later, I put my brush down, and slowly stretched. My neck was stiff and my hand was starting to cramp, even though I hadn’t been drawing. When I looked at the time on my computer, it was almost 5:30 in the morning.

The painting wasn’t done, but all it needed now were a few details. It looked as close to what I’d had in my head as anything I’d ever painted. I wished it wasn’t still wet, so I could run my finger over the ridges of paint. Instead, I took my brushes and cleaned them and set them out to dry, put my paints away carefully, and washed my hands. I hesitated before going upstairs, thinking maybe I should shower in the workout room before going up. But Brian was getting up in a few minutes. I’d wait and shower with him.

I went into the kitchen and started the coffee, and then went upstairs. The clock said 5:58. I went into the bathroom and turned on the hot water, and stripped off my paint-smeared t-shirt and pants. I heard the alarm go off, and a minute later Brian stumbled into the bathroom and over to the toilet to piss, his hair sticking out all over the place and his eyes half-closed.

He flushed the toilet. “I’d say ‘My, you’re up early,’ if your side of the bed had been slept in.”

I got in the shower and left the door open for him, and started soaping myself up. “Yeah, I lost track of time.”

Brian got into the shower and wrapped his arms around me and rested his cheek on my hair. “Mmmmm. Wake me up when I’m clean.”

I laughed and reached behind him and soaped his back and shoulders, and did my best to wash him even though he was resting on me like dead weight. “You have to minimally cooperate here, Brian.”

He lifted his head and smiled at me sleepily. “Tell me you made coffee.”

I stood on my toes and kissed the tip of his nose. “I did.”

I buried my face in his neck, and licked at the hot water running down his skin. His arms were lying lightly over my shoulders, and his head was tipped back. I followed the water down, lightly licking his nipples on the way, then knelt in front of him and lapped the moisture out of his navel.

I looked up at him, and he was smiling at me. I grinned back, and moved my hands down over his ass and to the backs of his thighs, pulling him close while I let my tongue swipe over the head of his cock. I tasted just a little bit of pre-come mixed with the water, and I thrust my tongue in his slit, trying to find more.

Brian gave a moan and his hands went into my hair. I brought my right hand up and grasped his cock at the same moment I closed my lips around him. He moaned again, and I let my tongue play over the smooth head of his cock, then dip into his slit again. I flattened my tongue on the little spot under the rim that he loved me to lick, and then followed the big vein down to where it disappeared under my fist, and then back up again.

Brian had backed up a little so he could lean against the tile wall, and I moved with him and nestled my face in his cock and pubes for a minute, and then moved my lips up and down his cock, my tongue flat as I went down, and then sliding over the head when I came back up. I moved my hand out of the way and went all the way down on him with the next thrust, and he moaned and pulled my hair, and spread his legs a little more.

I felt his cock hitting the back of my throat, and I swallowed, and felt another gush of pre-come. For some reason, the taste of him was making me crazy that morning, and I reached down for my cock and jerked on it while I kept sucking on him. I kept my lips locked hard on his shaft, and buried my nose in his pubic hair when I swallowed him again, and Brian’s hands shoved down hard on my head. I relaxed my throat, took him just that last little bit down, and then hummed softly while I swallowed. He gave a painful jerk on my hair, and groaned out my name, and then he froze and flooded down my throat.

Brian pulled me up, and I brought him the last bit of his come on my tongue, and he ate it out of my mouth while his hand slid down between us and grasped my cock. The water was still pouring down on both of us, and I came with my face pressed into the curve of his neck.

Brian dried us both, and I realized how tired I was, and let myself sag into him while he rubbed my hair dry. But even more than having not slept, I suddenly felt tired of trying to avoid crossing some line in the sand I wasn’t sure was even there anymore.

“I wish you weren’t going.”

His hands stopped moving on my head.

I kept talking. “I know I hate it when you try to stop me from doing things I think I need to do. But I also hate it when you don’t tell me what you think about what I’m doing.”

He didn’t say anything for a while, and when he did, his voice was quiet. “I’m leaving tomorrow morning. It’s kind of hard for me to try to change everything now.”

“I know. I just wanted to tell you.”

He kissed my forehead, then turned me around and pushed me out the door. “Go sleep.”

I nodded vaguely and crawled under the duvet, pulling his pillow into my arms and falling asleep almost before I even closed my eyes.

**Brian’s POV**

I was sitting in my office staring at my laptop, trying to find a small window of opportunity in my schedule for something other than work, sleep, and sitting on an airplane. It had been a long time since Justin had asked me not to go away.

I looked at my email, and decided it was my day for unsolvable problems.

I’d been trying for a month to get PlayStation 3 for Gus’ birthday, but it seemed there were some things even money couldn’t buy; it wasn’t going to be available until November and that was that. My next chance to give it to him was Christmas, and by then, all his little friends would have it.

I picked up the phone and called Lindsay. “So, if I can’t get this fucking PlayStation 3, what the fuck else does Gus want for his birthday?”

“Hi and how are you, too, Brian?” She sounded exasperated.

I waited.

She sighed.

“Okay, he likes all kinds of electronic games, especially the ones where everyone gets killed in spectacularly horrifying ways, but I’m pretty sure you’ve already gotten him all of those. Other than that, all he cares about are horses. And before you ask, if you ever bring up the horse thing again, I’ll have you killed. I know people.”

I opened up the “Gus” folder in my browser’s bookmarks, hoping I’d find something that combined horses and electronic games. “The only person you ‘know’ is me, and I’m not planning on hiring a hit man to have myself killed.”

Lindsay sighed again.

“You sigh too much.”

“It’s a side effect of parenthood.” I heard an electronic timer going off in the background. “Brian, I have to get these cupcakes out of the oven, there’s a bake sale at Gus’ school today and I have to drop them off on my way to the gallery.”

“And here I was complaining about having to be in Chicago, New York, San Francisco, LA, Costa Rica, and then Chicago again, all before the end of the month.” Better permanent jet lag than bake sales and cupcakes.

“You’ll be here for Gus’ birthday?”

“I wouldn’t miss it.” As long as I found him a present. I opened a bookmark that said “Horse.”

“Costa Rica?”

“It’s the new gay retirement and vacation paradise. You need to keep up.”

“I’ll try to brush up on gay demographic trends, after I frost these cupcakes.”

“Lindz?”

“Brian, I really have to go… what is it?” I heard the oven door slam.

“A giant carousel horse?”

“Define ‘giant.’”

“Life-sized.”

She paused for a minute. “I’m not sure. It could go in the family room. But would he like it?”

I put my head down on my desk. “I thought money could fix anything.”

“Welcome to the world of parenthood.”

“Who knew jerking off in a cup could have so many far-reaching and unpredictable repercussions?”

She laughed. “Not us, obviously.”

It was my turn to sigh. “I’ll call if I get any more brilliant ideas.”

“I’ll call if I think of anything guaranteed to make all Gus’ friends tell him that he has the coolest dad ever.”

“Thanks. I think.”

“Honestly, Brian, he’ll love whatever you get him. He’s your son. Get him something you’d have liked.”

I hung up the phone and then punched in Justin’s cell number. I heard music in the background when he answered.

“Hey. You woke up.”

“Yeah, sort of. What’s up?” The volume of the music suddenly dropped.

“Would Gus like a life-sized carousel horse?”

“I don’t think so.”

“Neither did Lindz.”

“No luck on PlayStation 3?”

“Nothing. Anyone at the magazine have anything?”

“Nope. I even had Kalli call our old boss, he said no way. And Michael called some comic book friends, nothing. You know what this means.”

I groaned. “Don’t say it.” The mall.

Justin laughed. It was my day to be laughed at.

“Later.”

“Later.” I snapped the phone shut, and went back to staring at my schedule.

Ted came in around 4 PM, to tell me that the deal to buy the warehouse next door would be finalized in the morning. I signed what he put in front of me, and sighed.

He lifted an eyebrow. “Second thoughts?”

I shook my head. “No, Theodore, I’m tap dancing with joy over the real estate deal, it’s the frequent flyer miles that are starting to get a little tedious.”

Ted violated our employer-employee relationship and sat down on the sofa. “You’re the boss, send someone else.”

“Who?”

“Cynthia, me, or any one of the dozen account executives who will soon be falling at your feet in gratitude at the additional office and conference space you’re opening up by buying the new building.”

“Are you suggesting I have a problem delegating authority?”

“No, there’s no problem, except that you don’t delegate it.”

I thought about that for a minute. “Justin asked me not to go on this trip.”

“What did you say?”

“That I was leaving tomorrow.”

“Ouch.”

I closed my eyes and leaned back in my chair. “I have advanced interpersonal communications skills. Why is this so hard?”

“You tell me.”

I opened my eyes. “Is that a little therapeutic tool you picked up from Blake?”

“I learned that one from you.”

“That’s your first mistake.”

Ted came over and sat in the chair next to my desk. I looked at him but didn’t say anything.

He spoke slowly. “Did you want to tell Justin you’d stay home?”

I nodded.

“Why didn’t you tell him that?”

“Because it was too late to cancel the trip.”

“No, why didn’t you tell him you wanted to, but couldn’t?”

I looked at him. “Because that’s bullshit? If I wanted to, I would.”

“Brian? Speaking of bullshit?”

I got up from my desk and walked over to the bar. “Fuck you.” But I didn’t say it in a mean way.

Ted got up and walked over to me, and patted me on the arm. I knocked back a drink and didn’t say anything, and eventually he left.

When I got home that night, there was music blasting from Justin’s studio, but by the time I was done working out, it was off. I was standing in the kitchen staring into the depths of the refrigerator when he came up behind me.

“There’s nothing there. We should go shopping.”

I shuddered and turned to look at him. “Normally those are my favorite words, but when you add the modifier ‘grocery’ to ‘shopping,’ everything changes.”

He laughed. “We have to get Gus a birthday present too, so bring your platinum card.”

“I’m not buying Gus a present at the mall.”

Justin raised his eyebrow. “That’s where they keep the stores, though.”

I shook my head. “They keep them in my computer, and of course, in New York City.”

He laughed. “Of course. Well, I have to find him something, unless we’re giving him a couples gift.”

“A couples gift?”

“It’s a lesbian thing.”

“Oh, okay. Then no, we’re not. Because however much of a twat you might be most of the time, you don’t actually HAVE a twat.”

“Thanks for noticing.”

I slammed the refrigerator door. “Let’s go find some food before you faint from starvation.”

“Brian. You were the one gazing into the refrigerator like a man whose last hope just died.”

“Delusional. It must be malnutrition. We’d better go.”

“To the market or the mall?” Justin looked confused.

I shook my head. “Neither. Out to dinner.”

“Are you asking me on a date?”

I smacked him on the ass. “Go get dressed.”

I followed him upstairs, not planning on going to dinner in my workout clothes. He got in the shower with me, and I scrubbed at the paint on his arms. 

“Justin?”

His forehead was resting against my throat. “Yeah?”

I stood there, letting the water beat down on my head. “We should eat.”

He looked at me. The water had beaded on his lashes. I got out of the shower and went into the bedroom to get dressed.

**Justin’s POV**

I didn’t know what was eating at him, but Brian was pretty much radiating tension all night. We went out for sushi, but he barely ate. I asked if he wanted to go to Babylon, and he said no, but when we got home, he drank two scotches before I even got my shoes off, and two more before I’d finished my beer.

I took one last swallow and set the bottle down on the table. Brian was sitting next to me, watching a movie, but his eyes were glassy and I doubted he was paying any attention. I picked up the remote and turned it off. He didn’t say anything, didn’t even blink.

I took his glass out of his hand and set it down next to my beer. I slid across his lap, wrapping my arms around his neck and touching his mouth softly with mine.

He kissed me back, but his restlessness was boiling out of him even while he let my tongue touch his. I knew he was drunk, and he felt like a mass of chaotic energy.

I buried my face in his neck, breathing in his smell, and then I stood up.

Brian looked up at me, and I looked back at him. “Come to bed.”

For a minute I thought he’d do it, but he shook his head. “You go.”

I wasn’t going to remind him that he was going away the next day. I just leaned down and took his hand. “Come on, Brian.”

I didn’t wait for him to agree, just pulled on his hand, and he stood up slowly. I kissed him again, and this time he felt more like himself, and his mouth was a little warmer.

We went upstairs, and I took his clothes off, and then mine. I pulled the duvet back and we lay down facing each other. His body felt tense and still, at the same time.

I ran my hand down his side and pressed on his hip. He looked at me, and I smiled at him, and blinked. Trust me, I thought.

After a minute he sighed and turned over, burying his face in his arms and letting his thighs fall open.

I sat back on my heels for a minute, thinking how beautiful he looked like that, before I dropped my face down and kissed the small of his back. He felt warm under my lips, but I could still feel the tension coming off him in waves.

I gently spread his ass cheeks and licked down his crack to his asshole, swirling the tip of my tongue around every little wrinkle and fold, feeling him pressing back into my mouth. I let my spit run down onto him, spreading it with my finger and pressing against the smooth spot behind his balls, probing into him with my tongue, and then using the wetness to let me slide a finger inside, too.

I bent my finger and let my knuckle brush against his prostate while my thumb pressed down from the outside. He gave a sharp groan and went up on his knees, dropping his face onto his forearms.

I got on my knees behind him, my finger still inside him. I moved my mouth to his balls, licking them, sucking one, then the other, softly into my mouth. I kept pressing on his prostate from the outside and the inside at the same time, and he lifted his head up and then dropped it back down. He’d moved his arms out, and he had the sheet clutched in his fists, and he was rocking back and forth against my mouth and moaning with the pressure of my fingers.

I gently pulled my finger out of him and sat back and picked up the lube, and filled my palm with it. I touched his ass lightly and he pushed back against my fingers, and I slid them in and lubed him, then pulled them out and covered my dick, too.

His knuckles were white against the dark sheet that was still bunched in his fists. I rested my forehead on his back while I went into him, biting my lip and holding my breath. When I was all the way in him, buried in him, his breathing ragged and shallow underneath me, I pulled back out and thrust in again, not rocking against him, but really fucking him.

Brian moaned twice and then started to move, pushing back every time I thrust into him. He was on his knees, and still had his face buried in the pillow in front of him. I bit my lip again, and took a deep breath, and tried to keep my mind on him and not let my orgasm rise up and wipe my brain clean, make me forget Brian and his body under me, surrounding and squeezing my cock.

Then he turned his head to the right, looking over his shoulder right into my eyes. His lips were parted and he was breathing fast. He’d never looked at me like that while I was fucking him, out from under his lashes, his eyes all glittery and dark.

I changed the angle of my hips and stroked across his prostate with my cock, and I saw him bite his lip and close his eyes, watched his face tighten with pleasure and then relax, and I stroked across it again. This time he didn’t close his eyes. He kept them open and locked on mine, and I fought back the wave of heat that washed over me.

I kept watching his face. I knew he was going to come, from the way his ass tightened on my cock, from the way his eyes looked, from the tension in his neck and his mouth. I knew it from the way he was moaning and pushing back into me, and how when I let my cock rub across his prostate he shuddered under me. I blinked the sweat away from my eyes.

Brian groaned and bucked back onto me, bringing me deeper into him, and clenching on me suddenly and fiercely. He started to come, and I saw his hands tighten on the sheet and heard it tear, just as his ass tightened on my cock. He gave a moan I usually only heard from him when he was coming inside me.

“Justin…” His voice was hoarse and desperate.

It felt like something hot untwisted itself at the base of my spine, and poured into Brian, while he arched himself back against me. I tried to keep my eyes open but I couldn’t, I had to close them and press my forehead against his back and bite at his shoulder, my fingers digging into his hips while I held myself rigid, coming and coming inside him.

I opened my eyes, and he’d let go of the sheet.

I lay there on him for a long time, and finally eased my cock out of his ass. I cleaned us off, and then pulled the duvet up over us both. He turned around and I settled into his arms.

I kissed his chest. “Do you want me to set the alarm?”

He sighed. “Yeah. My flight’s at 7:30. Can you set it for 5?”

I sat up, set the alarm, and lay down again, Brian’s hand in my hair.

**Brian’s POV**

When I came out of the terminal in Pittsburgh at the end of the week, I was surprised at how cold it was. I got into the car and settled into the back seat while Evan drove me out to the house. I tried Justin’s cell, but it rolled to voice mail.

When I got home, the house was dark, except for the outside and hall lights. It was just a few minutes past midnight, but his studio was dark, too.

I turned on the lights and looked around. There were three new paintings, one of which I’d seen in its earliest stages, two completely new to me.

I sat down at Justin’s worktable and stared at the painting hanging directly across from me, on the big empty wall. The lower half was a cacophony of green tones, with just enough of a hint of form to suggest they were meant to be leaves and trees. The green became completely abstract as it narrowed and erupted up in the middle of the painting, and the top was a pale yellow field, ridged and heavy with pigment. It was both totally unlike anything he’d ever done, and absolutely identifiable as being his.

I put my head down on the table and closed my eyes. Obviously, I should go out of town more often.

“Brian?” Justin was standing in the doorway, wearing his sweatpants and nothing else. “What’s wrong? What are you doing down here?”

I gestured at his paintings. “Fuck, Justin.”

He looked at them, and then back at me. He looked confused. “What?”

I shook my head. “Sometimes it’s just a little overwhelming.”

He stood there for a minute, and I kept looking at the painting.

He shifted from one bare foot to the other, and then frowned at me. “Let’s go to bed. We have Gus’ party in the morning.”

I stood up, and he waited in the doorway until I left the room, then he switched off the light and we went upstairs. He was curled up in bed and mostly asleep when I got in with him.

“Justin?”

“Hmmm?” He didn’t open his eyes.

I kissed his forehead. “Happy Gus’ birthday.”

He didn’t just wake up, he sat up. And looked at me with something like the expression I probably had when I looked at his painting downstairs. “Brian.”

“Yeah?”

He got out of bed and shoved his hand through his hair. I sat up and looked at him, wishing I’d stayed in Chicago. “What?”

“Can’t you just fucking say it?”

I stared at him.

“What, no sarcastic comments that it’s not that you can’t, it’s that you won’t?”

Now I got up. “Where the fuck did that come from?”

He sat down on the bed, and then lay down, staring at the ceiling. “Fuck if I know.”

I sat next to him. “You’re freaking me out, Justin.”

He laughed. “Yeah. I know the feeling.”

I sat there for a minute, trying to figure out what I was supposed to do. “I don’t know what I’m supposed to do.”

Justin opened his eyes and looked right into mine. “Happy anniversary, Brian. I met you six years ago tonight, and you took me home and made love to me, and I haven’t stopped loving you one day since then.”

I lay down next to him and looked up at the ceiling. “I’m not good at this.”

“I know. Try.”

I said it quietly. “Happy anniversary.”

Justin turned his head and looked at me. I just slanted my eyes a little so I could see him, but I didn’t turn my head.

“Come on, we should get some sleep.” Justin crawled up to the top of the bed and wriggled under the duvet, and then pulled it back for me. I lay down next to him, and almost hesitated before I pulled him against me.

Love was fucking exhausting.

**Justin’s POV**

I woke up with Brian pressing kisses into my neck, and when he fucked me, I came so hard it hurt. He lay on me, my legs still loosely wrapped around him, my feet resting on the backs of his legs.

“Brian?”

He kissed my neck but didn’t say anything.

“We should get up.”

He sighed and carefully pulled out of me, and then held out his hand to pull me up with him.

We showered and then went to Mel and Lindsay’s. There was a gigantic inflatable Superman bounce house in the backyard. Melanie waved at us over the fence when we walked up to the front door.

Brian and I went in and I put Gus’ present with the rest of them. Lindsay came over and kissed us both hello, and Brian grabbed a soda from the ice chest on the floor.

“No beer? And you couldn’t get a Rage jumpy house for the party?”

Lindsay laughed. “That’s a marketing opportunity Justin and Michael seem to have missed.”

Brian and I walked outside and stood watching the kids jumping. Gus was inside the house, bouncing and falling with everyone else. He hadn’t seen us yet.

“So, what did you end up getting him?”

“Something I always wanted.” He took a swallow of his soda.

I raised an eyebrow. “And?”

“It’s in the garage.”

“You got him a CAR? Brian. He’s six years old.”

He laughed. “I know how old he is. Come see it.”

I followed him back inside and then through the kitchen to the garage. Sitting in the corner behind some boxes was a child-sized Corvette, dark green, just like daddy’s.

“Where the fuck did you get that?” I couldn’t believe it. “Does this thing run on gas?”

“eBay. And no, it runs on electricity. You just keep it plugged in and it recharges.”

I kissed him on the cheek. “You’re amazing.”

He nodded. “It’s true. I am.”

I turned him so he was facing me, and went up on my toes and kissed him, hard. He put his soda on the boxes stacked next to the car, and then held my face in his hands and kissed me, his tongue gently tracing inside my lips.

We went outside, and I felt my stomach clench when I saw Michael standing next to Mel, who was holding JR. Brian rested his hand on my back.

“I guess I need to talk to Michael.”

“I guess you do. But you don’t have to do it today.”

“Yeah, I do. I’ve been putting it off all week, he’s called me three times.”

“He’s probably figured it out, Justin.”

I shrugged. “Maybe. But I have to tell him.”

Brian surprised me by kissing my cheek, but he didn’t try to argue with me. Gus finally caught sight of him, and came hurtling out of the bounce house screaming “Daddy” at the top of his lungs.

Brian laughed and caught his six-year-old ballistic missile, and I gritted my teeth and went over to Michael.

He gave me a look when I said hello, and I decided Brian was right. He’d figured it out.

“So, you didn’t call me back.”

“I know, I’m sorry. I was working, but I should have called.”

He looked at me. “How’s it going?”

“The painting’s going fine, but I’m not going to make the deadline for Rage.”

He was quiet for a minute. “Are you going to stop drawing the comic?”

“Michael, I swear, when my show is over, I’ll draw it. I want to draw it. I just can’t do both.”

“Because of your hand?”

I didn’t answer right away. “I think this was just too much work in too little time. I can’t just… turn it on and off like that.”

“Justin.”

I looked at him and bit my lip.

“Justin, if you’re going to stop drawing the comic, you need to tell me.” He looked upset, more than angry.

I shook my head. “No, really Michael. I’d tell you. I love Rage. It’s just… hard to know which important thing is more important sometimes.”

Michael looked down at the ground and scuffed his shoe in the dirt. Then he shrugged. “I know. It’s just, this is really important to me. And I can’t do it without you.” He looked at me then. “And I wouldn’t want to do it without you.”

I nodded. “I’m not stopping. I just need to focus on the show right now.”

We started walking towards the house, and Michael looked at me. “Did you tell Brian?”

I laughed. “He told me.”

Michael grinned. “He sucks that way.”

“How’s Ben?”

“He’s fine. He’s starting on the new drug therapy at the end of next week.”

We went inside and got some food, and then sat down in the living room. Everyone was outside, so we had the sofa, and a few dozen helium balloons, all to ourselves. I put a forkful of lasagna in my mouth cautiously. I actually tasted meat.

“Hey. This isn’t terrible.”

Michael nodded. “I know, my mom put her foot down. And you know, Mel and Lindz aren’t vegetarians, they’re just lesbians.”

“Does that make any kind of sense?”

He shook his head. “None. That’s why mom made the meat lasagna.”

“Damn right, I did.” It was Debbie, earrings clanking as she plunked down next to us on the sofa.

I took another bite. “It’s good, Debbie.”

“Of course it’s good. It’s my Nonna’s recipe. Doesn’t get any better than that.”

Michael whispered in my ear. “She got it out of a magazine when I was around twelve.”

Debbie reached across me and smacked his cheek. “I heard that.”

Suddenly a flood of six year olds crashed through the front door, and the general decibel level went up by a factor of ten. I must have flinched, because Michael laughed. “That’s my cue.”

He got up and went back outside, but I stayed with Debbie while the kids and a few moms started piling food onto paper plates in the dining room.

She looked at me. “You look tired.”

“I’m tired.”

“Uh huh. Why?”

I looked out the window, then back at her. “I just… can’t quite figure out how it all fits together.”

“How all what fits together?”

“Brian. Art. Rage. My hand. Money. Living here.”

“Oh. You mean, everything. Life.”

I laughed. “I guess so.”

She ate some lasagna. “Justin, Sunshine, if I had the answer to that, I’d be goddamned Oprah Winfrey. All I can tell you is, he fucking loves you. I’ve never seen him like this. He’s so happy it scares the crap out of me.”

I got up and went over the window, and then turned around and looked at her. “Scares you?”

“Love like that’s a scary thing.”

The kids came back in then, so I went outside, thinking about what Debbie said, and looking for Brian. He was sitting out on the front porch, smoking, but he put it out when he saw me.

I sat down next to him. “You know, cigarettes I don’t see you smoke are just as bad for you as ones I do.”

He smiled sideways at me. “I know.”

“Brian, are you happy?”

“I could use a drink and something to eat other than Debbie’s lasagna, but otherwise I’m fine.”

“I mean, with how things are, with us. The house. Work. Art. Life.”

He stared at me for a minute. “We’re at a six-year-old’s birthday party and this is what you’re thinking about?”

I nodded. He looked away from me, and then sighed and put his arm around my shoulder. “Are you happy?”

I looked at him, and smiled. I should have made him answer first, but this wasn’t a game, it was a conversation. “Yeah, I’m happy.”

He sat there, and I thought he probably wished he hadn’t thrown away his cigarette. I rested my head on his shoulder, and tried not to think.

“When you came back, I was really happy.”

I was confused. “From New York?”

He shook his head. “From Ethan.”

I had a sudden urge to get up, but I didn’t. “Fuck, Brian.”

“I was. I honestly thought that was as happy as I could get. I had you, and half of gay Pittsburgh, and a great job, and everything just the way I’d always wanted it.” He stared at the houses across the street, and I just sat there, feeling uncomfortable.

He sighed. “And then I lost my job, and everything with you got… complicated. And then we ended up here.” He stopped talking.

“I think you skipped a bunch of stuff.” I bumped him with my shoulder.

He looked at me. “That was the complicated part.”

“And now?”

“If you want to fuck me, all you have to do is ask, you don’t have to fabricate these discussions of our relationship.”

I laughed. “Asshole. Answer me.”

“Can you repeat the question?”

“Are. You. Happy.”

He took a deep breath. “Justin, do you really not know how happy I am?”

I tried to think what to say. “Remember when you said Debbie told you to tell me you loved me, the first time we lived together?”

“The zucchini man?”

I nodded. “And I said I knew you loved me then, but I didn’t know you knew it?”

“I remember.”

“It’s like that. I know you’re happy. I guess I wonder if you know it.”

He looked at me silently for a minute. “I know it.”

“Good.”    

The door opened behind us, and Lindsay came out. “Brian, the kids are going to have cake now, and then open presents. Did you want to get the little car out of the garage?”

Brian tipped his head back and looked at her. “Yeah, we’ll bring it in.” She smiled and went back in the house, throwing a last look over her shoulder at us, and winking at me before she shut the door. I put my head back on Brian’s shoulder for a second, then I stood up and put out my hand.

He stood up, and for a minute I just looked up at him. His arms were resting lightly around my shoulders, and he leaned down and touched my forehead with his.  “Justin, I love you.”

I smiled, because I couldn’t help it. I rested my hands on his arms and kissed his jaw. I looked at his eyes, and felt something tense inside me snap.

“I love you, too.” I kissed him again. “Now come on, we have to go make Gus happy. And his friends sick with jealousy.”

Brian laughed and tugged me after him down the path to the garage.


	4. Risks, Chapter 4

  
  
**Risks, Chapter 4**  
By Xie

“ _Do you want me to tell you something really subversive? Love is everything it's cracked up to be. That's why people are so cynical about it. It really is worth fighting for, being brave for, risking everything for. And the trouble is, if you don't risk everything, you risk even more_.” -Erica Jong

**Justin’s POV**

I woke up to the sound of the alarm, and heard Brian groan from somewhere on top of me. I was lying on my stomach, my head partially under the pillow, and the rest of me mostly under Brian.

He rolled off me, and then hit the alarm. I burrowed a little deeper under the pillow, and he swatted my ass through the cover. “Nice try. Get up.”

I shook my head, even though he probably couldn’t see it. He laughed. “Up.”

I grabbed at the duvet he was pulling off me, but I was too late. I rolled over, groaning. “Jesus, Brian, I’m a mess.”

He looked at me, his tongue shoved in his cheek, and then nodded. “It’s kind of sexy, in a raunchy, debauched way.”

I laughed, and rubbed my eyes while I stretched. “You’re supposed to tenderly clean me off with a warm towel, not pass out on my back.”

He leaned down and gave my hair a tug. “I tenderly passed out on your back. Now get up.”

I heard him turning on the shower, and I stretched again, then got up and followed him in there.

We got to Ben and Michael’s a little late, but they hadn’t started eating yet. It wasn’t really warm out, but it was sunny and cool, a beautiful October day, and I went out to the back deck with my coffee. Mel was sitting at the picnic table, watching Hunter push JR in the swing.

I sat down across from Mel. “Where are Lindsay and Gus?”

She shrugged. “Gus had some kind of microscopic baby football thing this morning.”

“Huh?”

Melanie groaned and put her head down on the table. “Tiny-Mite football. For six-year-olds.”

I sipped my coffee. “Wow. Tiny-Mite. I think they had that when I was little, but I must have repressed it.”

She nodded glumly. “Anyway, Lindsay took him. He seems to have some kind of natural athletic ability.”

“Yeah, Brian’s good at most sports.”

“Now you tell me.”

We sat there drinking coffee until Emmett stuck his head out the back door. “Brunch is served, if you want more than just caffeine.”

Brian was already sitting at the table with Ted and Blake, and I sat across from him. Ben smiled and put a plate in front of Brian, and one that looked just like it in front of himself when he sat down. “Egg white omelets. Low carb toast.”

Michael set a plate of waffles, scrambled eggs, and sausage in front of me. “And for us, real food.”

Emmett laughed and took a plate out of his hands. “Gimme some of that.”

Ted grinned at Michael. “Real food over here, too.”

Ben smiled. “So, Brian, are you going to join us campaigning for Casey this afternoon?”

Brian snorted. “Yeah, Professor, that’s just what’s going to happen. I’m going out door to door for a candidate whose slogan is, ‘A Democrat who’s almost, but not quite, as far right as Santorum’.”

“Santorum is one of the worst enemies our community has ever had. Casey’s not perfect, but he’s not Santorum.” Ben was frowning.

“Great, that’s his other slogan: ‘Vote for me, I’m not Santorum.’ Christ, the Democrats are such pussies.”

I interrupted. “Brian’s already given the legal limit to Casey.”

Brian stirred sugar into his coffee. “We also serve who only write large checks.”

Emmett had gone into the kitchen for more coffee, and was standing there, a speculative look on his face. “So, Teddy, are you still a proud registered Republican?”

Every eye in the room turned to Ted, who shrugged. “I’m not ashamed of being a fiscal conservative.”

“But?” Emmett looked amused but also determined.

“But, I’ve changed my registration to “no affiliation.”

This time Blake interrupted. “He changed it three years ago.”

Emmett’s eyes softened. “Oh, Teddy. And you let me think you were a Republican all these years.”

Hunter shook his head while he shoved in a forkful of pancakes. “Dude, a gay Republican, that’s twisted.”

Melanie smiled at Michael as he refilled her coffee cup. JR was sleeping on her lap. “You told me you were giving up on the Republican Party when we were going door to door against Prop 14, Ted.”

“The Republican Party gave up on me.”

Melanie snorted her coffee. “Oh please, that bunch of right wing nut jobs never wanted you. You’re just a fucking faggot to them, and not all the Log Cabin Republicans in the country can change that.”

Brian bumped my leg with his foot under the table, then stood up. “And on that happy note, I think I’ll leave all you happy little campaign workers to your appointed rounds. I have an empire to run, and a plane to catch in the morning.”

Michael laughed and walked Brian to the door. I started helping Emmett clear the table.

I took Ben’s plate, and saw his hand go to his back while he stood up. “Let me help with that.”

I frowned. “I’ve got it, what’s wrong with your back?”

He shook his head. “I must have twisted something at the gym the other day.”

Michael came up behind him. “He pushes too much. But then he takes his shirt off and I can’t find it in my heart to tell him to stop.”

Ben smiled and kissed Michael’s cheek. “I promise not to stop as long as you keep looking.”

**Brian’s POV**

I unfastened my seat belt before the plane came to a full stop, ignoring the reproving look from the flight attendant.

When I got to the house around midnight, a light glaze of frost was covering everything, and I left footprints in the ice crust on the front steps.

I came into the house and turned off the hall light and started to go upstairs, and noticed the light was on in Justin’s studio. I went in and saw him sleeping on the sofa, and knelt down and shook his shoulder. “Hey.”

He opened his eyes and blinked twice before his eyes focused, then sat up, shoving his hand through his hair. “Hey. You’re back.” He blinked again.

I stood up, slung my bag over my shoulder, and pulled him up. He followed me upstairs, and by the time I got out of the bathroom, he was curled up in bed, the duvet thrown back on my side, his bare leg lying outside the cover.

I got into bed, and he rolled into me, and I kissed him, feeling his arms wind around my neck, listening to the soft moan humming in his throat when I shifted him onto his back.  He was spread out under me, naked and open, just like he always was for me, and I pushed inside him while his legs wrapped around my waist.

His hands were on the back of my neck, and his eyes were locked on mine, and his pupils were dark. He was rocking his ass up onto me, using his muscles to stroke me inside him. I dropped my head, resting my forehead on his, trying not to come yet, even though I knew he wanted me to.

He moved one of his hands to his cock, and I shifted my weight a little and slid my hand between us, too. Mine was covered in lube, and he let it grasp him, but kept his own hand over mine. He gripped me with his ass muscles again and I moaned and kissed him.

“Justin…” He moved my hand faster. I stopped trying to hold it back and made three rapid thrusts into him, and then froze while I came. He held his hand still while I grunted and pulsed into him. When I was done I stayed kneeling between his legs, and he took his hand away. I looked into his eyes and fisted his cock until he came, staring at his face, watching him flush and his eyes get even darker.

I wasn’t sure how long we’d been asleep when I felt him jerk in my arms. I opened my eyes and held his shoulders with my hands. “Justin.”

He jerked a little again, and I repeated his name and held onto his shoulders more firmly, and this time he woke up. He licked his lips and shook his head. “Fuck.”

“It’s okay, what was it?”

I felt him shrug a little while I pulled his back against my chest. “The old one.”

“Mmmmm.”

He sighed. “Do you think these will ever stop?”

I thought about it. “I don’t know. But they’ll probably go back to how they were before.”

Justin didn’t answer, and I thought maybe he’d fallen back to sleep, but when I looked down at his face, his eyes were open.

He smiled a little. “Thanks.”

“For what?”

“Not saying you told me so. About talking to Daphne and stirring all this shit up again.”

“Yeah, well, if it wasn’t still in there, it couldn’t get stirred up.”

Justin laughed shakily. “That’s true, I guess.” He turned around inside my arms and I let him settle into me, his head on my shoulder. I felt my eyes drifting closed again, but I forced them open and bounced against him a little.

“Hey. Don’t go back to sleep yet. You’ll just start the dream over.”

He sighed and stirred, and opened his eyes. “I know.”

“Tell me about your paintings.”

He moved his head off my shoulder and rested it on my chest. His hair felt warm and soft under my hand, and I let my eyes close while he talked.

“I’m really happy with them.” His voice sounded sleepy. “I just… keep painting. I don’t even know where it’s coming from most of the time.”

 “Justin?”

“Mmmm?”

“Think about painting now… just imagine you’re painting something and fall asleep.”

I felt his lips smile against my skin. “Okay.”

I let myself fall back to sleep.

The next morning, I was downstairs waiting for the ready light on the coffee maker, when Justin came into the kitchen, rubbing his eyes.

“What the fuck are you doing up?”

He shrugged. “My sleep times got all fucked up when you were gone.”

I looked at him for a minute. He had dark circles under his eyes. “You should go back to bed, Justin.”

He nodded. “I will. I just want some coffee.”

“Addict.”

“Pusher.”

He leaned into me, and I slung my arm over his shoulder. He was looking down, his cheek against my chest.

 “Jesus, Brian, you have bare feet.”

I glanced down. “Jesus, Justin, you have extremely dirty white socks on.”

“There’s frost on the ground outside. Aren’t you cold?”

“We have central heat. The frost is outside.”

He nodded. I left him sucking down coffee at the kitchen table, his feet tucked under him on the chair, and went to Kinnetik.

I was on a conference call late that afternoon, when Ted came in the room. He made a slicing motion across his throat with his finger, and I raised an eyebrow, and then hit the mute button on the phone.

“What?”

“Michael tried to get you on your cell, he’s at the hospital with Ben, they found something on his ultrasound. He sounded really freaked out.”

I was punching in the number for Michael’s cell phone before he finished talking. “Get Cynthia to take over, or… do you want to come with me?”

He shook his head. “Go. One of you call me when you know what’s up.” He sat down at my desk and I grabbed my coat and left. I’d just gotten Michael’s voice mail, they probably made him turn off his phone at the hospital.

I was halfway there when my phone rang. It was Michael.

“So, what’s going on?”

“I got your message, you don’t have to come…”

I rolled my eyes. “Shut up. What happened?”

“They were just doing a routine ultrasound to start him on the TIND protocol, and they saw something weird on his pancreas, some kind of cyst.”

I heard a voice in the background, and then Michael came back. “A pseudocyst.”

“Is that Deb?”

“Yeah.” Good. She was there.

“Where’s Ben?”

“They’re admitting him, they say they have to do more tests and then, if everything else is okay, they have to do surgery on his pancreas.”

Michael sounded like he was losing it, and I mentally cursed the assholes in front of me and every red light between Kinnetik and the hospital. All of which did a shitload of good. Then I heard scuffling noises, and then Deb.

“Brian? Michael went out into the hall, the doctor wanted to talk to him. And they’re putting Ben in a room now.”

When I got to the hospital, the three of them were in a room, and Ben looked fine. Michael seemed a lot calmer, too, and Debbie was cracking her gum and beaming at them from a bedside chair.

Michael jumped up when I got there, and Ben smiled at me, and made an almost imperceptible motion with his head towards Michael.

Ben started a conversation with Deb just as Michael got to my side, and I pulled him out into the hall.

“What did the doctor say?”

Michael shrugged. “He said we wouldn’t know more until some of the tests were back, they’re concerned about his kidneys. Hopefully they can do the surgery the day after tomorrow, they want him on antibiotics for a couple of days first.”

I nodded. “That doesn’t sound too bad.”

Michael looked at me for a minute. “You don’t think so?”

“I don’t think so.” I said it firmly. “What does Ben think?”

“He says he feels fine.”

“See?”

He went back in the room, and I called Justin, but just got his voice mail. A passing staffer glared at me for using my cell phone, and I turned it off and followed Michael into the room.

After around half an hour, I was starting to think if Michael stroked Ben’s hair or hand one more time I was going to murder them both. Debbie gave a particularly loud snap of her gum.

“So, Brian, Carl dropped me off, any chance I could get you to take me home?”

I knew a hint when I heard one, so we said goodnight and walked out to the Corvette.

“So.” Her tone was conversational. “This sucks dick.”

“That about sums it up.”

She huffed in annoyance. “Can’t this poor guy ever get a break? I mean, he’s just about to start this new drug therapy. And now, this.”

She slid into the Corvette passenger seat, and I shut her door and went around and got in on my side. She was fastening her seat belt.

“Good fucking thing I stuck with my diet, or I’d have never gotten in here. Or out.”

I smirked, then pulled out of the lot and headed for Deb’s place.

“Did you get Sunshine?”

“I left Justin a message. He hasn’t called back yet.” I’d checked my cell as soon as we got out of the hospital.

Debbie looked out the window as we drove, and after a few minutes, rain started falling. I turned on the windshield wipers.

“This weird ass weather, first the frost, and now all this rain.”

“Well, you know what they say. Into each life some rain must fall.” I turned down her street.

Debbie gave me a sharp look. “Uh huh. I always know we’re in trouble when you start spouting clichés. What do you think, really?”

I didn’t answer right away. “I think we have to wait and see what the test results show.”

“Do you know anything about this?”

I wished I didn’t. “Yeah, sometimes the pancreatic problems cause kidney failure.” Respiratory failure, too, but I decided to leave that part out.

“Jesus fucking Christ.”

I nodded as I pulled up in front of her house. “That about covers it.”

I got out and opened her door, holding my hand to help her out. She stood on the curb next to me, and I let her look into my face for a long time. She smacked my cheek and then went up on her toes and gave me a kiss right where she’d smacked me.

“Thanks for the ride. And for being there for Michael.”

I shrugged while she rubbed her lipstick off my face. “Old habit.”

When I got home, only the automated lights were on. I frowned and went into Justin’s studio, and he was sound asleep on the sofa, in the dark. I could see his cell phone in its charger on his desk, in the dim light from the hall. I switched on the lights in the work area, and stood looking at his paintings.

“Brian?”

I didn’t turn around. “These are good.”

“Thanks.” He yawned. “Did you eat?”

I didn’t answer, and he came up behind me. I shook my head. “I called, but it went to voice mail.”

“I wanted to concentrate. Is something wrong?”

“Ben’s in the hospital.”

“Fuck.” He went and sat down on the sofa again. “What happened?”

I shoved my hand through my hair, and walked over and sat down next to him. “He has to have surgery on his pancreas. Assuming his kidneys are functioning.”

Justin sat there, chewing his lip. “How’s Michael?”

I shrugged. “He’s fine.”

“Fuck.”

I looked at him. “What?”

Justin got up and went to his desk, and picked up his phone. “He called, too.” He kept hitting the button. “He called three times. I’m an asshole.”

“You were working.”

“I was asleep.”

That seemed weird to me, but I couldn’t think about it just then. I just sighed. “Let’s go to bed.”

Justin laughed, not happily. “I just woke up. And I need to work.”

I got up and walked to the door. “I’ll see you when you come up.”

I stripped off my clothes, and half-talked myself into doing something more productive than sleeping, like working out or getting in the hot tub or drinking half a bottle of scotch in front of the TV. But at the last minute, I just got into bed and fell into a black sleep.

 **Justin's POV**  
   
I went up to bed and crawled in with Brian at around 4. I made myself get up when the alarm went off, because I wanted to vote and then go to the hospital. But I felt like crap.

Brian and I were standing in line at the polling place near the house. It was the first time I’d voted out there. I was blowing on my hands to warm them up, and Brian reached out and held them. His hands were warm, and I felt a little shock at the heat of his skin against mine. I smiled into his eyes, and he smiled back. One of our neighbors was staring at us from over by the coffee table, but I just smiled at her and nodded. She turned bright red and looked away.

I mouthed, “Bitch,” and Brian laughed and kissed me.

“Fuck her.” He said it right into my mouth. “Go vote Santorum out on his right wing ass. That’ll show her.”

After we voted, we stopped at the hospital. Michael was already there, but official visiting hours didn’t start until 11, so we couldn’t see Ben. Brian got Michael on Ben’s room phone, and he came down and met us in the cafeteria.

I was eating a muffin and drinking more coffee when he came in. Brian saw him first and stood up and hugged him. I got up and hugged him, too. He looked tired.

I got him a cup of coffee, and he sat there, not drinking it.

Brian rolled his eyes. “Do we have to pull it out of you one word at a time, or are you going to just tell us?”

“They said his kidney values aren’t good enough for surgery, they want to try a few more days of antibiotics and fluids first.” He took a swallow of the coffee, then made a face. “I put too much sugar in this.”

I took the cup and went and dumped it, and filled it again. When I got back to the table, Michael was shredding a napkin and Brian was listening intently to him. I put Michael’s coffee in front of him, and he murmured, “Thanks.” But he didn’t drink it.

Brian put his hand on Michael’s, and he instantly stopped pulling the napkin to pieces. “So, they’re keeping him until they see how his kidney values respond to the treatment?”

Michael nodded. “Yeah, because he could need dialysis.” He choked a little on the word. “And they said they have to watch his lungs, when the kidneys fail, sometimes the lungs do, too.”

Brian kept his grip on Michael’s hands. “He’s going to be fine, Michael.”

Michael looked at Brian, and then at me. “You don’t know that.”

“Sure he does.” I said it with total confidence.  “He’ll be fine. And so will you.”

Brian looked sharply at Michael. “Did you go home last night?”

He shook his head.

“You should get some rest.” Brian’s voice was as gentle as I’d ever heard it. “Let me stay with Ben, or Justin can, and you go home and sleep. Then come back this afternoon.”

Michael looked from me to Brian. “I have to vote, too. They’ll let Ben vote here, but I have to go to the polling place by the house.”

Brian nodded. “Good. Let’s go, Justin can stay with Ben until you get back.”

I slung my messenger bag over my shoulder and took the elevator up to Ben’s room. I hesitated, and knocked softly on the open door. Ben opened his eyes, and smiled at me.

“Hi, Justin. Did you see Michael?”

I walked over and kissed his cheek. “Yeah, Brian’s taking him to vote and get some sleep, and I had to promise to sit with you until he came back.”

Ben laughed, then held his side for a second. I bit my lip. “You don’t have to sit with me, Justin, I’m probably just going to sleep. They’re giving me morphine.”

“Yeah, well, Michael made me promise. So, you’re stuck with me. But go ahead and sleep. I thought I might have to hang out at Kinnetik, so I brought stuff to do.” I gestured at my bag, which I’d set on the floor next to the bed.

Ben looked at me for a minute. “How did Michael seem to you?”

“Tired. But okay.”

He nodded. “I’m glad Brian’s taking him home. He didn’t sleep much last night.”

I smiled. “He’s not getting the good drugs.”

Ben chuckled. “You’re welcome to my share.”

I shook my head. “I’ll stick to recreational drugs, thanks. Hospital grade opiates aren’t my idea of a high.”

He laughed. “Well, I offered.”

Ben fell asleep a few minutes later, and I got out my sketchpad. I drew him, because he was there and I felt like drawing. But I hadn’t slept much the night before, either, and after a while I felt my eyes starting to close. I set the pad and pencil down, tucked my feet under me, and went to sleep, my head pillowed on my balled up jacket.

I woke up from a confused dream, a hand on my shoulder. I opened my eyes, and it was Debbie.

“Hey, Sunshine.” She was whispering, or as close as Debbie ever got to whispering. I glanced at the bed, and Ben was still asleep.

I stretched, and yawned. “Michael went home to sleep, and I promised I’d sit with Ben until he got back.”

She nodded. “I know, Brian called me, he’s downstairs. He thought you might want to go get some lunch, I’ll stay for a while. Go.”

I put my sketchpad in my bag, left Debbie with Ben, and went down to the lobby. The Corvette was right outside the main doors, and I got in and slammed the door. “Hey.”

“Hey. Hungry?”

“Brian.”

“Sorry. My mistake.”

We went to the diner, and I made Brian order something. But he didn’t eat much except french fries he stole from my plate, drowned in ketchup. I wordlessly offered him some of my milkshake, and he shook his head. “I have to draw the line somewhere.”

I smiled. “It’s good to have principles, however idiotic.”

He tried to smirk, but it didn’t work. I sighed. “This sucks.”

He nodded. “Funny, Debbie said the same thing. And it didn’t even suck quite as bad as this at that point.”

His cell phone rang, and he glanced at it, then answered. “Theodore.”

He listened for a few minutes, and then sighed. “I’m at the diner with Justin, can you bring them over here? We’re going back to the hospital.”

The waitress brought our check just as he snapped his phone shut.

“Problem?”

“They need my signature on some paperwork.” He shrugged. “Ted’s bringing it over.”

We waited out on the sidewalk for Ted. It had gotten colder; it almost felt like it might snow. I shivered, and Brian opened his coat and wrapped it around me. I stood there with his arms around me, the warmth from his body trapped under the coat, my face on his chest, and thought about when he was sick, and how Michael must feel. I pressed my forehead into him.

He kissed my hair.

I was too tired that night to sit up and watch the election results, and despite his addiction to electronic toys, Brian had never wanted a television in the bedroom.

“You could bring up your laptop.” I was pulling my sweater off, and kicking my shoes onto the floor of the closet.

He shook his head. “No, let’s go to bed. Then we’ll wake up in the morning and we’ll know.”

I kissed him when he leaned over me, and when he slid his cock inside me and started to suck the skin of my neck into his mouth, I thought I’d explode from the feeling. He was fucking me slowly and tenderly, almost too slowly, and I asked him for more, for harder. He paused for a second, and then thrust deep inside me in one hard motion, then pulled out and did it again, with me arching up and throwing my head back.

He fucked me hard, and I choked his name and came, not even touching my cock. He fucked me through my orgasm and then kept going, until I almost wanted to beg him to stop because it was too much. Then I felt him coming, and all I wanted was to feel that forever, that rush of heat and wetness filling me inside.

I fell asleep with Brian still inside me, but when I woke up, he was shaking my arm and saying my name. I ground my teeth and hit the pillow with my fist. “FUCK.”

I knew he hated it when I got angry about the nightmares, but I was sick of waking up almost every night. And I needed to sleep.

I took a deep breath and let him pull my back against his chest. “Sorry.”

“It’s okay.” He didn’t keep talking, and I thought he’d fallen back to sleep. He usually tried to keep me awake for a little while, so I didn’t just go back into the nightmare.

I sighed and rested my head on my arm and tried to sleep, but I was really just staring off into the darkness. After a few minutes I felt Brian’s lips on my neck, and I turned my face to him and kissed him. It was a deep, wet kiss, and I broke away after a minute. I put my hand on the side of his face.

“I’m okay, Brian, you don’t have to….”

He snorted and pulled my hand down to his cock. “Yeah, I do.”

I laughed. “My post-traumatic stress disorder turns you on?”

He pulled my hips back against him and buried his face in my hair. “No, I think it was your bare ass shoving up against my cock that turned me on.”

“Oh. Yeah. That’s one of the symptoms of PTSD. Bare ass shoving.” I demonstrated.

This time, when I fell asleep, I didn’t wake up until morning.

**Brian’s POV**

Justin and I woke up to the news that the Democrats had taken the House, and had a shot at the Senate, and Santorum was out on his gay-hating ass.

Unfortunately, the day went downhill from there. Ben’s kidney values were worse, not better, and they were seriously discussing the possibility of dialysis. I was in the kitchen, drinking coffee and pinching the bridge of my nose while I talked to Michael on the phone, when Justin stumbled into the room.

“Michael? Hang on.” I glared at Justin. “You, back to bed.”

He shook his head. “I’m going to help Hunter at the comic store for a while.”

“Fuck that. You had three hours of sleep last night, if that.”

He ignored me, and I told Michael I’d call him back. My headache got worse.

I sat at the table while Justin made his disgusting herbal shit and drank coffee.

“Does your acupuncturist know you’re not sleeping?”

He nodded. “Yeah, she changed my herbs. But just a couple of days ago.”

I tapped the table with my finger.

“She also knows my partner is an obsessive, anal-retentive control freak.”

I smiled. “Does she have herbs for that, too?”

Justin laughed. “I’ll ask her.”

I stopped at the hospital on the way to Kinnetik. Michael came down, and we talked for a while. He was acting anxious, and I knew he wanted to go upstairs. I promised to come back at lunchtime, and went into the office.

My phone rang around 12. “Hey.”

“Hey. Do you want to get some food and then go to the hospital? Hunter’s okay here, and I said I’d come back around 4 so he could go visit Ben.”

I swung by the store and picked him up. I didn’t feel like eating, but Justin made me stop and get pizza slices.

When we got to the hospital, Michael was sitting in the lobby with Melanie and JR.

“They wouldn’t let her upstairs, so I was just visiting my little pumpkin down here.” Michael had that besotted look on his face he got when discussing his daughter. Which was better than the look of fear and exhaustion he’d had that morning.

Melanie smiled at me and hugged Justin. “Lindsay’s upstairs with Ben, and Debbie’s on her way. So now might be a good time to go up.”

Justin went upstairs, and after a minute, Melanie went with him.

“Any news?”

Michael smiled into JR’s eyes. “More of the same.”

I watched him make a fool of himself with the baby. “Ben must be happy about the election, though.”

Michael laughed. “He’s thrilled. So am I.”

The elevator doors opened, and Lindsay got out. I stood up and kissed her cheek, and she smiled. “They said only two of us at a time.”

Michael looked up, alarmed. “That’s new.”

Lindsay smiled reassuringly. “Probably just some power-mad administrator, Ben seemed fine. A little sleepy.”

Michael nodded. “It’s all the pain meds they’re giving him.”

Justin came down when Debbie got there. I drove him back to the store, and he was biting his lower lip.

“What?”

“He looks worse.”

I didn’t say anything for a while. “It could just be the meds and stress.”

He nodded. “Hunter’s going over now, and I’ll come home after I close up. I need to work for a while.”

I started to say something, and he cut me off. “AND I need to go to bed, I know. I will. I promise.” He leaned over and kissed me, and I watched him go into the store before I pulled away from the curb.

I went back to the hospital after work. Ben was asleep, and Michael had gone home to take a nap. Hunter and Debbie were sitting in the room, and Debbie came out to talk to me in the hall.

“They say if his kidneys aren’t improving by tomorrow, they’re going to start dialysis.”

“Fuck. Does Michael know?”

“Not yet. He’d gone home to sleep when the latest test results came in.”

“I’ll go by the house, and tell him.”

She shook her head. “Let him sleep, he’ll be back here the minute his eyes open.”

I knew she was right. I hugged her, stuck my head in the room to tell Hunter to hang in there, and then went home.

Justin was in his studio, the sleeves of his paint-spattered sweatshirt pushed up.

“Hey. I was just about to clean up.”

I doubted that, but I didn’t say anything, just went and looked at what he was working on while he washed his brushes and changed into a clean sweater.

We went out to the media room, and I poured myself a large glass of scotch. I held the bottle up and raised an eyebrow, and he nodded. “Just one.”

He sat next to me on the sofa and we watched television for a while, jumping from one news show to the next, watching the Republicans try to spin total defeat into some kind of victory. And failing. It was almost enough to cheer me up, especially after I’d finished off what was left in the bottle.

I walked over to the bar to get more, and Justin watched me from the sofa.

“He’ll be okay.”

I snorted. “Like Vic was okay?”

Justin walked up to me, ignoring my death glare, and put one hand on each side of my face. He looked right in my eyes. “No. Like I was okay, like you were okay. Like Michael was okay. He’ll be okay.”

“You don’t know that. You can’t know that.”

Justin was quiet for a minute. “No, I can’t. But I believe it.”

I broke away from him and shoved my hand through my hair. “I don’t fucking know what that means, Justin.”

He didn’t answer right away, and when he did, his voice was quiet. “I know you don’t.”

I felt a rush of anger, and I didn’t even try to shove it down. “Who knows what’s going to happen in a year, in ten years? Who the fuck knows what’s going to fucking happen tomorrow? You of all people should know that.”

Justin stared hard into my eyes. I felt like I couldn’t breathe, trying to think what to say. I looked away from him, and back.  My face felt stiff. I was too fucking drunk to have this conversation. Which unfortunately didn’t shut me up.

“Justin. I’ve given you everything I can. You want me to believe in happily ever after, too? Well, I can’t.”

I hated the look I saw on his face before he turned away from me. How someone who’d been thrown out by his own father when he was just a kid, nearly gotten killed by some asshole he’d jerked off once, and loved me for six years could still believe in fairy tales was a fucking mystery to me. But he did.

“Justin.” I had no idea I was going to say anything until I heard myself say his name.

He had his arms wrapped around himself, and he turned around and faced me. “Brian, I really, I can’t right now. I just can’t.” And he walked out of the room.

I stood in front of the window for a few minutes, staring after him. And then I followed him upstairs.

I must have stood at the window longer than I thought, because he was already in bed, the duvet pulled up over his shoulders, his back to me, and the lights out.

I got in and almost just lay down on the far edge of the bed, and then I thought, fuck it, and slid up against his back. I felt him sigh, and I put my head on his pillow, his head under my chin, my arm over him, and closed my eyes.

I woke up the next morning, and my mouth tasted like dirty socks and my head was pounding. I groaned, and raked my hand through my hair. Justin wasn’t there, although when I went into the bathroom, his towel was damp. I went downstairs, and he wasn’t in his studio. I looked in the garage, and his car was there.

I grabbed a jacket and went out the front door, and headed down to the bench by the swings. He sat there sometimes and sketched. He didn’t look up when I came down the path, just kept drawing. His hand was shaking a little, so I knew he’d been there a while. And it was cold. I sat down next to him.

I could only see the side of his face, and his lips looked tight. “Did you look for my car?”

I was embarrassed, but I just answered him. “Yeah.”

He kept sketching. “I’m not leaving.”

“I know.”

“Are you?”

I shoved my hand through my hair. “Fuck, Justin.”

He stopped sketching and just waited. I put my hands on his shoulders and turned him to face me. “No, I’m not leaving.”

He stared at me, then nodded, and went back to his drawing, and I snapped. “Justin, for fuck’s sake, look at your hand.”

He dropped the pencil.

I sighed and took his hand, but he pulled it away and shoved it in his pocket.

“I know you’re pissed. Or hurt.”

He started to say something, and I cut him off. “Justin, just let me… just let me, okay?”

He looked at me, and nodded.

“I’m not giving you some message. I’m just telling you the truth. I don’t know if I can have that kind of faith in the future. It’s not that I don’t have faith in you.”

His whole body was tense. He didn’t say anything.

I cleared my throat. “You told me once we need to want the same things. I thought we did want them. Don’t… don’t change the rules on me now.”

I got up, and stood staring down at the swings. I couldn’t look at him.

I heard him sigh, and I turned around. “Brian…. I just, I don’t know. I did say that, but it’s not a rule, it wasn’t a … a condition of our being together.”

I nodded, but I didn’t say anything. My brain felt blank. I really didn’t know what he meant.

He seemed to realize that, so he tried again. “I didn’t mean you have to want what I want for us to be together. I meant that the only way we’d have a future is if we did want the same things.” He sighed, sounding frustrated. “God, I hate this.”

I laughed. It sounded bitter. “That’s my line.”

“Everyone always tells me I sound like you.”

I tipped my head back. “God. I didn’t know.”

Justin got up and came over to me. “Brian, I know you. I know what you’re telling me. I don’t really care what you can and can’t say. Everything you do, everything you’ve done, says you do believe in a future for us.”

I felt a muscle twitch in my face. Justin kept talking. “You kept our wedding rings. You kept this house, and even after I went to New York, even when you told me you honestly thought you’d never see me again, you finished remodeling it. You built my studio.”

He put his hands on my shoulders from behind. “I’ll just have to keep believing what you do instead of what you can’t, or won’t, say. I guess it’s just a habit I can’t break.”

Part of me wanted to tell him to break it, not to believe that hard. I would never understand how Justin kept believing in things, but I didn’t have the energy to fight it. I turned around and let him stand inside my arms. I didn’t think. I didn’t mentally argue with him. I just stood there, my chin on his head, my eyes closed.  
 **  
Justin’s POV**

I honestly didn’t know what to say after we got back to the house, so I just shut up. I think Brian was surprised I didn’t go into my studio, but I went into the kitchen and made some eggs and a fresh pot of coffee. I ate my breakfast while Brian scrambled his egg whites, and we sat there drinking coffee and not talking.

Brian got up, put his empty cup in the sink, and turned to face me, leaning on the counter. “I’m going to the hospital.”

I looked at him, my eyebrows lifted.

“If you want to come.”

There were times when Brian reminded me of Hunter at his sullen, teenaged worst.

I nodded. “Let me change, I’m not going in sweats.”

When I came downstairs, Brian had pulled the Corvette out of the garage and was idling it in the driveway. I got in, and he pulled out while I was still fastening my seatbelt.

The news at the hospital was actually good. They’d changed Ben’s antibiotics and his kidney values had improved slightly. They were even talking about sending him home in a few days, and then trying to do the surgery in a month.

I started to tell Michael I’d cover the store for the next few days, when I caught Brian shaking his head at me. I shut up, and he dragged me into the hall.

“Justin, your paintings are due in two weeks. Less.”

“I can do both.”

“Yeah, good thing you don’t need to sleep.”

“What do you want me to do, Brian? Just let the store be closed?”

“Let Hunter do it.”

“Hunter has school.”

“You have work to do.”

We stood there glaring at each other, and then I decided to give in. Somewhat. “He has a midterm at the end of the week, I’ll cover for him just that day.”

Brian jerked his head and went back in the room, and I thought for a minute about the irony of Brian telling me to get more sleep and work less.

Then I went home to paint.

**Brian’s POV**

I stood in Justin’s studio. He’d come upstairs and told me he was done, and then got in the shower.

I was still standing there when he came hesitantly into the studio, his hair wet. “Well?” He actually sounded nervous.

It was the most beautiful thing he’d ever painted. There really wasn’t a better word. Not all Justin’s paintings were beautiful, even if they were all brilliant. But this one was. It was a great swirling mass of blue, with bits of black and silver in it, just a gigantic explosion of sky and night. And I’d have gladly given back every painting of Justin’s I had, the four pieces I wanted for Kinnetik, every drawing he’d done of me or Gus or the house, all of it, to have this.

“Justin.”

He smiled at me.

“I want this one. If you don’t want me to buy the others, too, I want this one more.”

He laughed a little. “Do you remember the night after I had a nightmare, and you told me to imagine I was painting?”

I thought for a second, then nodded.

“This is the painting I imagined while I fell asleep. And then the next day, I started painting it.”

I folded my lips in, and stared at him. Then I turned and stared at the painting. When I turned around, he’d gone to his computer. I walked over to him, and cleared my throat.

“Thanks.”

He smiled. “Yeah.”

Justin had a meeting with an agent Adrienne Bennett had recommended, in New York the day after Thanksgiving. We’d decided to drive down on Thanksgiving, and spend the weekend dancing and fucking and doing drugs, interspersed with shopping.

We left late morning on Thursday. About half an hour outside of Manhattan, Justin pulled off the road, tossed me the keys to the Land Rover, and crossed over to the passenger side of the car. Smart lad.

I unpacked while he tried to make a dent in the hotel’s hot water supply, and he finally emerged from the shower with one towel tucked haphazardly around his waist and another he was about to use on his soaking wet hair.

I walked over to him and took the towel out of his hands, and rubbed his hair. He leaned his weight into my hands, and closed his eyes. After a minute, I let the towel drop to the floor and started kissing him. His skin was cool and damp, and he tasted like water. I unhooked the towel from around his waist and tossed it on the bed, while he pushed harder against me and opened his mouth for my tongue.

I pushed him face down on the bed, and lay on top of him, my weight on my hands and knees, my mouth on his neck. I dragged my tongue down his spine, licking the water off his skin. He wriggled into the bed, making the little sounds he makes when he’s happy and turned on. I put just the slightest pressure on his thighs and he opened them for me, letting me nuzzle his cheeks apart with my face and hands, lifting up just enough so I could see his hole, pink and damp from the shower, his balls hanging heavy beyond it.

I stared at him for a minute, and he pushed back a little, looking for my tongue, and I trailed it down his crack and lightly over his hole, swirling it around the little smooth spot behind his balls. I licked his balls, tracing their surface with my tongue, then probing a little harder, feeling the contours of what was inside them while my finger pressed against his perineum.

Justin was barely breathing. I slid my tongue back and flicked it over his hole, then blew across it, and he shuddered and said my name softly, imploringly. I suddenly pressed my tongue flat against his opening and worked it into him, feeling the rough little ring of muscle clench and then open, letting me in.

I don’t know how long I licked him and kissed him, nibbling at the pale smooth skin of his inner thighs, playing with his balls, pressing on his prostate from the outside and rubbing it on the inside. I felt breathless and dizzy, and I never wanted to stop. My dick was hard and begging me to fuck him, and I ignored it, burying my face in the heat between his legs, and my tongue in the hot tight tunnel of his ass.

Justin moaned and reached around and grabbed at my hand, dragging it to his cock. It was hard and leaking. The towel was soaked, and I worked the pre-come all over the head and shaft, while Justin shuddered under me, and then started chanting, “Fuck me, fuck me, fuck, Brian FUCK ME,” over and over.

So I did. He turned over while I lubed myself, and I slid my arms under his legs and lifted him up a little, my hand reaching around and under him to hold my cock at his opening. I pressed the head in, feeling him bearing down and opening up at the same time, letting it slide all the way in, slowly, until I was deep inside him.

I bent over him, still holding his legs on my arms, pressing my forehead against his shoulder, kissing and biting at the skin of his neck and throat, tasting his sweat and the salt of his skin. His ass felt hot and tight around my cock, squeezing it and releasing while I pulled back and then moved back in, against the tightness. He clamped down on me hard and I gave a startled moan, and pushed in deeper.

When I came, it lasted a long time, and I felt him come, too, his hand working his cock between us, his come flooding out hot onto my abdomen and chest.

I followed the pools of come on his skin with my tongue, licking them up, letting my tongue play with his nipples and in his navel. I cleaned his cock and his pubes, and then I slid my arms under him and lifted him up, licking my own come out of his ass and from between his thighs.

At first he was boneless and pliant, his arms thrown back over his head. But he started to thrust his asshole towards my mouth while I licked him, and when I touched his cock, it was getting hard again. I settled myself between his legs and mouthed his cock, tracing the vein that ran down it, then swirling my tongue over the head. I felt it get rigid against my lips, and Justin gasped when I pressed my tongue against the sensitive spot under the rim.

He came the second time with his hands grasping my hair and his back arched, his feet flat on the bed on either side of my shoulders, moaning my name.

Justin usually liked to talk after sex. Not this time. The minute he finished coming, he curled onto his side, burrowing against me, shaking. I wrapped him up in my arms and held him until he calmed down, and then watched him fall asleep. I pulled the blankets out from under him carefully, and covered him, and went into the other room.

**Justin’s POV**

I felt Brian’s lips brushing the nape of my neck, and I murmured and pushed back against him without opening my eyes.

“Dinner’s here. You have to get up.” But his voice sounded like that might be negotiable, so I just murmured again. Wrong.

“Justin?”

“Hmmmm?”

“You’re one second away from me pulling the blankets off and dumping you on the floor.”

I opened my eyes and shoved the blankets off with my legs, and then streteched against the sheets, smiling at him.

He looked at me. “I can’t fucking believe you’re hard again.”

“I’m young yet.”

He shook his head. “I rimmed you until you lost the power of speech, I made you come twice, the second time so hard you passed out for an hour, I ordered your Thanksgiving dinner, and then I sat out there amusing myself all alone waiting for it to come while you slept like a dead person in here. Get up and eat.”

I laughed and sat up. Brian went into the other room, and I pulled sweats and a sweatshirt and socks out of the drawer. Brian had unpacked all my stuff. I was just lucky he hadn’t gotten around to organizing it by color and fabric yet.

I followed him into the other room, lifted one of the silver covers off a plate, and laughed. “The traditional Thanksgiving steak and french fries?”

He grinned at me.

After dinner, I took another shower, and got dressed. I was staring out the window at the holiday lights edging the commercial buildings of the New York skyline when Brian came out of the shower. He stopped when he saw me.

“Where the fuck did you get that?”

I smiled. “Emmett and I went shopping.”

“That’s hot.”

“He said you’d say that.”

Brian walked up to me and ran his fingers down the front of my shirt, and then trailed them over the bare skin at my waistband. “Fuck.”

“He said you’d do that, too.”

I stood by the door waiting while Brian shrugged into his leather coat. He pulled something out of the pocket and showed it to me.

I laughed. “The traditional post-Thanksgiving dinner hit of ecstasy?”

Brian grinned and raised his eyebrow.

I shook my head. “Not tonight. I want to be able to get some sleep, to meet the agent tomorrow.”

He nodded, smiled, and took mine as well as his.

We got to the club, and walked down the stairs into a big, open space. It wasn’t as full as it probably was on a normal Thursday night, but it was crowded. I felt the music and the lights have their effect on me, even without Brian’s ecstasy. We danced for a while, and I felt him moving against me, his arms in the air. I put my hands on his shoulder and shook my hair out of my eyes, and danced with him. He smiled at me, his eyes black, and then let his arms slowly drop down until they were resting on my shoulders. He touched my forehead with his.

We danced a long time, and then we kissed, and he walked me backwards to the wall near the bar, and kissed me some more, his hands sliding up under my shirt, his fingers gently pulling on my nipples and tickling my belly. I could have stood there all night, letting Brian kiss me, but I decided to be a good boyfriend and keep him well hydrated. I pulled him over to the bar and bought him some water. He smiled at me kind of dreamily and tipped his head back when he drank it. I watched the muscles in his throat as he swallowed, then traced them with my tongue after he put the bottle down.

I nuzzled into him and guided him the few steps back to the wall, where a partition stood to keep people from seeing directly behind the bar. It was dark on the other side, and I let enough of my weight fall onto Brian that he leaned against the wall in the dim light.

I’d opened his shirt on the dance floor, and I traced his chest muscles and nipples with my tongue, and unfastened his jeans. He had his head back against the wall and his eyes closed, his hands lightly resting on my shoulders.

I let my face slide down his chest and belly, and felt his sweat on my cheek. My hands slid under the waist of his jeans and pushed them off his hips, and I freed his cock and sat back on my heels, looking up at him.

He smiled down at me, and I grinned back, then deliberately licked from his balls to the rim under the head of his cock, and back down again. I glanced up, and his eyes were closed again. He had one arm down at his side, palm flat against the wall, and the other barely resting on the back of my head, his fingers curved around my neck.

I sat up a little more and let his cock bounce against my chin and then pressed my throat along the length of it, leaning into him and bending my head back. He looked down at me, startled, and his lips parted and his eyes half-closed when he saw me. He started to breathe faster.

I settled my mouth around his cock and stroked him with my lips, and wet my finger in my mouth. When he felt me wetting my finger, he shifted a little, moving his legs further apart. I didn’t know if he even realized he was doing it.

I touched his hole, circling my finger softly while I sucked his cock, then pressing it inside at the same moment I let him slide into my throat. His hands grasped at my hair then, and I felt his back arch, his thighs straining.

He tried to spread his legs more, but his jeans weren’t all the way down, and I bent my finger and brushed his prostate. He groaned my name, and I kept swallowing him and playing with my finger in his ass, my knees pressing into the cement floor, my face buried in the soft hair at the base of his cock.

When he came it was sudden. One minute he was arching into my mouth and panting, and the next he was holding my head tight against his groin, not moving, while I swallowed the hot rush that hit the back of my throat.

When he was done, I stood up and kissed him. He was still breathing hard, and when he looked at me, I smiled and blinked, and kissed him again.

He cleared his throat and folded his lips in, and smiled, his eyes half-closed. “Was that the traditional post-Thanksgiving dinner public blow job?”

I laughed. We danced for a little while longer, but I dragged him back to the hotel before 2, so I could get some sleep before I met with the agent. He complained the entire time we were in the elevator, but he was sound asleep before I even got into bed.

Brian had an amazing ability not to suffer the effects of whatever he’d done the night before. Two cups of coffee with breakfast and he was ready to shop. I was still groaning at him to shut the fucking drapes when he cheerfully slammed the suite door on his way out.

When I got back to the hotel, he still wasn’t there, but there was a message from him on my cell phone, wanting to know how the meeting went. I called him, and he answered on the first ring.

“Hey.”

“Hey. It went really well, I liked her. A lot.” I’d met with three other agents, suggested by Lindsay or Adrienne, but this was the first one I’d felt really looked at my work the same way I did.

“Good. What’s next?”

“She said she’d send an agreement to my attorney and we could proceed from there.”

“Which means you need an attorney.”

“I thought I’d use the guy who reviewed my contract with Armand.”

“Okay. Where are you?”

“At the hotel.”

“I’ll be upstairs in a minute.”

He walked in, and dropped his coat on a chair.

“Didn’t you buy anything?”

He stared at me. “Of course I bought things. I’m surprised, in fact, there’s anything left in Manhattan for anyone else to buy. I’m having it all shipped.”

I nodded. “Of course.”

We spent the weekend fucking and dancing, and I went to a gallery with Kalli while he shopped on Saturday afternoon. On Sunday afternoon, we retrieved the Land Rover from the custody of the hotel, and went home.

It was dark when Brian turned down our street. I was surprised to see Christmas lights on our house.

Brian ducked his head to see out my side of the car better. “It looks like the fairies were at work while we were gone.”

He turned into our driveway and hit the garage door opener. He left the door open, and we walked back outside to look at the house.

“I still can’t believe you had Emmett do this again, with Gus not staying with us this year.”

“Well, I wanted the neighbors to see how it’s done when faggots are in charge.” He glanced scornfully towards the house across the street. Last year, they’d had a gigantic inflatable Frosty the Snowman on their front lawn, and it had deflated slowly over the course of a week. Fortunately, you couldn’t see it from our house.

I stood there in the cold, Brian’s arm lightly resting on my shoulder, looking at the lights. And after a little while, we went inside, switched off the timer, and went to bed.


	5. Risks, Chapter 5

  
  
**Risks, Chapter 5**  
By Xie

 _All right, I'll take a chance, I will fall in love with you.  
If I'm a fool you can have the night, you can have the morning too.  
Can you cook and sew, make flowers grow,  
Do you understand my pain?  
Are you willing to risk it all  
Or is your love in vain? _ \- Bob Dylan

**Justin’s POV**

I went into the kitchen, and Brian was pacing between the table and the counter, his cell phone clutched to his ear, rubbing between his eyes with his other hand. All he was wearing was brown sweatpants. I got some juice out of the refrigerator and sat at the table, drinking it and watching the muscles in his back and upper arms flex while he paced. There were worse ways to spend an evening.

He finally snapped the phone shut. “Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck everything.”

I swallowed the last of my juice. “Trouble at the office, dear?”

“Worse.” He slammed his phone down on the counter and picked up a half-empty beer bottle and downed it in one swallow. “They left a message the car won’t be ready for another week. At least.”

I tried to look sympathetic. His Corvette had been in the shop since we got back from New York, and he had a rental car.  “At least it’ll be home by Christmas.”

He glared at me. I got up and got myself a beer, and another one for him.

Michael was coming over to work on Rage in a couple of hours. I’d originally planned on going to his house, but Hunter had called and said if we didn’t get Michael out of there, he and Ben were leaving. Brian had been over there a few times since Ben came home from the hospital, and had commented to me one night that obsessive pre-surgical hovering appeared to be one of the character traits Michael had inherited from his mother.

I looked speculatively at Brian, who was leaning against the counter, halfway through his second beer. “You should go work out, work off some of that stress.”

He gestured at his sweats. “I just finished working out.”

“How about a long, slow blowjob?”

His lips quirked around the beer bottle, but he didn’t let himself really smile. “Good to see all the money I spent on your education wasn’t totally wasted.”

I got up from the table, walked over, and took his beer bottle and set it behind him on the counter. I put my arms around his neck and leaned against him hard. He smiled at me, and his eyes looked tired. I kissed him more softly than I’d meant to, and then pulled back and looked at him.

I touched my hand to the side of his face. “You okay?”

He touched his forehead to mine. “Nothing getting my dick sucked won’t fix.”

I stood on my toes and kissed him, and then he sighed. “I should really shower.”

“Go shower. I’ll be up in a minute.”

I went into my studio and grabbed a few things for my meeting with Michael, and brought them out to the media room. Brian was in the shower when I got upstairs, and I leaned against the sink and watched him. He had his head tipped back and the water was beating down on his head, running off the ends of his hair, and taking an erratic path down his body.

After a minute he shook his head, turned off the water, and saw me watching him. He smiled at me through the water-splashed glass, then opened the door and got out.

I handed him a towel, and he dried his hair and then his body. I went into the bedroom and kicked off my shoes, and took off my sweatshirt and jeans.

I pulled him onto the bed and ran my hands over him. His muscles were still hard from his workout, and his skin felt hot from the shower.

He started to roll over on top of me, but I pushed him back against the pillows, and lay down next to him on the bed. I slid down and nuzzled his thighs apart, and licked and sucked at his half-hard cock. I loved the feeling of it getting hard in my mouth.

I knew exactly when he let his mind go blank and just let me suck him off, all his awareness on what my mouth was doing to him. My right hand was lying across his abdomen, and he reached for it and held it, clenching his fingers around mine.

He came so deep in my throat there was almost no taste of it my mouth. I crawled up to him and kissed him. His eyes were closed, and when I pulled my lips away from his, he opened them, and gave me a sleepy smile. I kissed him again, on the jaw, and watched his eyes close. After a while he was breathing quietly, and I started to slide off the bed. He caught at me with his hand, and when I looked at him, his eyes were open again.

“Come back.”

I lay down, with my head on his chest, and he started to slide his hand down my arm, but I reached up and curved it around his neck. “It’s okay, Brian. Go to sleep.” I felt his chest rise and fall under my cheek, and a few minutes later he was really asleep. I pulled the duvet lightly over him and went downstairs.

**Brian’s POV**

I woke up and wasn’t exactly sure what time it was. Or even what day. After a few minutes, I realized Justin hadn’t pulled the drapes; it was dark out. I lay there a little longer, and gradually thought, Saturday. Nighttime. Home. Justin put me in a coma with a blowjob.

I sat up and ran my hand through my hair. I pulled on a pair of jeans and went downstairs. When I got down there, I heard noises from the media room, and then I remembered Michael was coming over to work on Rage. I changed directions and went into the kitchen, but instead of the junk food I expected Michael to have brought, it looked like Justin had actually cooked.

“Hey. You’re up. There’s plenty, help yourself.” It was Justin, standing in the doorway smiling, Michael behind him.

Justin set his and Michael’s dishes in the sink while I put whatever was in the red sauce in the pan on my plate. I sniffed at it, and looked up. Justin was laughing at me. “It’s chicken cacciatore, Debbie’s recipe, according to her, handed down through countless generations of the Grassi family, according to Michael, courtesy of Redbook magazine circa 1982.”

Michael snorted. “Yeah, you pick who to believe.”

I followed Justin and Michael back into the media room. They had all the lights on, and Justin’s sketches were lying all over the floor, on the coffee table, on the desk, and on half the sofa.

I sat down, shoved some drawings out of the way and set my plate on the coffee table. “How come when Ted and I work in here, we manage to keep everything on the table? It wasn’t even this much of a fucking mess when Gus was here.”

I caught them glancing at each other, and then Justin started gathering up his sketches from the sofa and table while Michael picked up the rest.

They went to Justin’s studio, and I turned on the television and ate, then went and poured a glass of scotch. I stood with it by the window, and could see the lights from the Christmas tree in the living room reflecting on the wet ground outside.

I don’t know how long I stood there, but after a while, I heard Justin saying goodnight to Michael, and then saw Michael walking down the path to his car.

“Brian?” It was Justin in the doorway.

I didn’t turn around, just put my glass to my mouth. But it was empty.

I felt him come up behind me. He put his hands on my shoulders firmly, and turned me around. I let him, and he took my glass and set it on the windowsill. He looked at me for a minute, but he didn’t ask me what was wrong. Nothing could have annoyed me more than if he had, but the fact that he didn’t pissed me off, too. I almost laughed.

Whatever Justin was looking for in my face, he apparently didn’t find it, because he stepped back from me and went and sat down on the sofa. He glanced at whatever was on the TV, and then picked up the remote and shut it off.

The room felt too quiet without the television, and I turned back to the window.

“When do you leave?” His voice was quiet.

“Monday.” I had to go to LA and Costa Rica for three days, and wouldn’t be back until Wednesday night. I had to go again in February, for five days. I’d been thinking I’d ask Justin to come, but I hadn’t yet.

I picked my glass up and went and refilled it, and drank it down. “I’m going to bed. See you when you come up.”

Justin looked at me and just nodded.

I thought I’d lie awake for a long time, but I fell asleep almost instantly. I didn’t wake up when Justin came to bed, but I woke up when I felt the bed jerk and heard him make a familiar sound in his throat. I leaned on my elbow, and woke him up.

He rolled away from me, and brought his arm up over his head, and then rolled back. I sat next to him, and then I scooted down and pulled him into my arms. He resisted for a minute, and then put his head on my chest, and I snaked my fingers into his hair. “Five days.”

I felt him nod. “Yeah, it’s getting better.”

“Good, maybe you won’t have one while I’m gone.” I felt him tense when I said that.

“Maybe.”

He didn’t say anything, and I thought he’d gone back to sleep.

Then I heard him sigh. I thought he was going to say he wished I wasn’t going, but he just settled against me, and after a while, I fell back to sleep.

**Justin’s POV**

Brian left Monday morning, and I spent most of the time he was gone working on Rage. Late Wednesday afternoon, I was sitting on the counter at Red Cape, watching Michael re-arrange the window display. We’d been working on the comic until my hand started shaking enough that Michael noticed. We were still arguing over a part of the storyline involving world-renowned paleontologist Ken Kuschner and the mad scientist whose re-animation experiments had enabled Rage’s enemies to come back to life. We argued for at least an hour over something that would be covered in about five words of dialogue, and not change so much as one line of the drawing for the scene. We finally decided to talk about it again later.

Michael glanced over at me. “So, Brian’ll be home tonight?”

I nodded, and took a sip of my coffee. It had gotten cold. “Late, but tonight.”

“Good. Maybe you’ll get some sleep when he’s back.” He frowned at me. “You look like crap.”

“Thanks.”

“You don’t need coffee, you need a nap.”

I ignored his advice and swallowed more coffee. “You know, I have my own mother, and I have your mother. I’m not actually in need of someone else to nag me about getting enough sleep.”

He nodded, but didn’t look convinced.

I slung my bag across my back and went to the door. “I’m going to get another coffee, want one this time?”

“Yeah, there’s money in the…”

I was already out the door. “I’ll get it.”

When I got back, Michael didn’t bring up my lack of sleep again, and we talked about Rage until Hunter came in, to get a ride home with Michael. I stood on the sidewalk while Michael locked the shop up.

He slammed down the grill. “Want to come for dinner?”

I hesitated. Brian wouldn’t be home until late. “Okay.”

Ben was sitting at the dining room table with his laptop when we came in, and he smiled vaguely in our direction while he typed.

Hunter snorted and dumped his backpack at the foot of the stairs. “Genius at work. Call me when dinner’s ready.”

Michael picked up the backpack and silently handed it to Hunter over the railing. Hunter grabbed it and took it upstairs with him, rolling his eyes.

Michael headed into the kitchen. “Can I get you a beer, water, glass of wine, more caffeine?”

“Beer is good. Thanks.”

He opened a bottle from the refrigerator and handed it to me. Just then an oven timer sounded, and Michael walked to the doorway. Ben held up his hand. “Just a minute, I’m almost done…”

I helped Michael set the table, and after a few minutes Ben shut his laptop and cleared his papers away. I ate with the three of them, and after dinner, Hunter went upstairs to his computer, and Michael cleared the table. I went into the living room with Ben.

“How are you doing? Is the surgery still set for Friday?”

He nodded. “Yeah, and my kidney values have been normal for ten days now, so everyone’s very optimistic about it.”

“That’s good.”

Ben settled back and turned to face me. “You don’t look so great, if you don’t mind my saying. Are you okay?”

Michael was back at the dining room table, clearing some serving dishes. “He’s not sleeping.”

Ben raised an eyebrow. “You have insomnia?”

I shifted uncomfortably in my chair. “I just have some trouble sleeping. It comes and goes.”

“Because Brian’s gone?” He looked uncertain.

I laughed a little. “You make me sound like a lost little boy scared of the dark. No, it’s not that. I have nightmares, if he’s here, he wakes me up, if he’s not, I have the whole thing. It’s not a big deal, I haven’t even had one since he left.”

Ben thought about it for a minute. “Does he know?”

I snorted. “He wakes me up.”

“I mean that you don’t sleep well when he’s not here?”

“Yes.”

He nodded, and changed the subject. I stayed a little while longer, then went home. I still couldn’t quite believe Brian had let Emmett decorate the house again for Christmas, but I loved coming around the bend just before our part of the road, and seeing the house all lit up, and the tree in the window. I pulled into the garage, then came back outside and looked at it for a long time.

It hadn’t snowed in days, just a messy combination of sleet and rain that left everything looking kind of flattened and wet. But the lights on the house sparkled in the moist air, and reflected off the puddles on the ground. After a while I got too cold, and went in the front door.

I carried my portfolio and messenger bag into my studio, and stuck my iPod into its dock. I checked my email and then looked up the status of Brian’s flight online. He was still scheduled to arrive a little past midnight. It was almost 11.

I hesitated, and called his number and left a message on his voice mail. “Hey, call me when you get this.” I didn’t know why I did that. He might not check his messages until the next day, and I knew he’d come straight home.

I got up and went to my worktable, and started working on Rage until I felt the slight weakness in my hand that warned me it was time to stop. I’d found if I stopped the minute I noticed it, I could sometimes start working again in just fifteen or twenty minutes, but if I pushed it, I could lose hours.

Brian never called, even after the website confirmed his flight had come in on time, and I could hardly keep my eyes open. I lay down on the sofa, without turning off the lights, and fell asleep. I woke up when I heard the garage door opening, and I met him in the hall, rubbing my eyes.

He didn’t say anything, but his face relaxed when he saw me, and I felt something inside me relax, then, too. He set his bag down. I walked right up to him, and he put his arms around me, still wearing his coat and scarf. I leaned my forehead against his chest, and he put his cheek on my hair.

“I’d forgotten the lights until the car turned onto this part of the road.” His voice sounded a little rough.

I smiled up at him. “It’s nice. It’s the best on the street.”

He smirked. “Of course it is.” Then he kissed me.

**Brian’s POV**

When I came in the door, Justin was waiting in the hall. He had dark circles under his eyes, and when I held him, he sighed.

I felt my lips folding in, and I half wanted to walk away and half wanted to fuck Justin on the floor of the hall. I kissed him, and the minute I felt his mouth soften against mine, the familiar heat started to wrap itself around us. He was up on his toes, his arms tight around my neck, and his kiss almost desperate. I unbuttoned my coat, kissing him the whole time, and when I let it drop onto the floor, he finally pulled back, and laughed a little.

We went upstairs, and we both got undressed and into bed. The room was dark, and he felt smooth and warm under my hands. He lay on his back and pulled me down on him, but I resisted and turned him over with my hands, urging him up on his knees while I reached for the lube.

I slid my finger inside him, and he pushed back on it and moaned. I hesitated, then let my thumb rest at his hole, waiting until he felt open, and pressed it inside him, next to my finger. He groaned and I felt him straining against me, and then it slid in, the tight ring clamping down on the base of my thumb.

Justin broke out in a sweat and I eased my thumb out, and then put a second finger in with the first. He had his head buried in his arms.

I pulled out my fingers and put my cock at his opening, and waited, feeling how hot he was there. He pushed against me and I leaned down and kissed his back, tasting his skin and sweat. I let the head of my cock slide in, stretching him, then held absolutely still, waiting for him. He rose up and pushed back, driving himself down on me, surprising me. I felt him clamping on my cock with his ass muscles, pushing down until I was buried in him as deeply as I could go, my arms around his waist, my hands resting on his thighs, holding them open.

He gripped my forearms with his hands, and pushed himself up and back down, and let his head fall back on my shoulder. He worked my cock with his muscles, and I felt my orgasm start to burn at the base of my spine and spin out towards my balls and cock. I tried to hold it back, but he lifted himself up and rammed back down on me again.

I clamped my teeth down hard on his shoulder, and he said, “Brian,” and my fingers tightened on his thighs again. I tried to move my hand towards his cock, but he held it away, and started groaning while he raised and lowered himself on me.

My head was bent down, my mouth on his shoulder and neck, and he tightened his ass and slid up and down on me. I let my teeth close on his skin again, while everything shifted and burned inside me, and spilled out of my cock and deep inside Justin. I knew he was coming because his fingers dug painfully into my arms, his nails cutting into my skin, even before I felt his ass clamp hard on me.

I finally lowered him down and kissed the bite marks on his neck and back, and lay on top of him, trying to keep my weight off him, but cover him at the same time.

After what felt like a long time, when I was either asleep or almost asleep, I felt Justin move under me. I rolled over and let him turn onto his back, and pulled him into my arms. I knew we were smeared with come and lube and really should shower or, at least, clean up a little, but I was too tired to care.

I woke up the next morning alone. I was stiff and had a headache. I rolled out of bed and showered, then went downstairs and got some coffee. It was almost 10:30. I heard music from Justin’s studio, and took my coffee into the media room and checked my email and messages. I listened to Justin’s message from the night before, and wondered what he’d wanted. He hadn’t said anything when I got home.

I went out into the hall, where my bag was still lying near the door from the garage. I pulled my passport and some other papers out of the side pocket, and went back into the media room. I opened the safe to put my passport away.

I pulled out the folder I kept it in, and brushed against the corner of the box Justin’s and my wedding rings were in. I opened the box and walked away from the safe, over to the desk, and sat down. They looked just like they always did, smooth and platinum, catching the light.

I closed the box and stuck it under some papers when I heard Justin in the hall. He came in, and I glanced up at him.

“I just got your message from last night, did you need something before I came home?”

He shook his head. “I just wanted to know you got in.”

“The airline website…”

He cut me off. “I know.”

I looked at him for a minute, not sure what to say. “I didn’t even turn on my phone.”

“It’s okay, it wasn’t important.”  He nodded his head towards the safe. “The whole point of that is to keep it locked.”

I looked over. “I was putting my passport away and got distracted.” I got up and slipped my passport into its folder, and shut the safe door.

Justin sat on the sofa. “Are you going into the office today?”

I shook my head. “I’m going to work from home, and try to get to bed early. I told Michael I’d be there as close to six as I could.”

“Six?”

“Hospitals are terrible institutions, Justin. They make you stop eating and drinking at midnight, then tell you to come in at 6 in the morning, and then they don’t do your procedure until 3 in the afternoon.”

Justin got up and came over to me. “That’s why you’re supposed to have your loved ones hovering nearby, to entertain you while you wait.”

I just looked at him for a minute, and then nodded. He was standing right in front of me, and I put my hands on the back of his waist and pressed my face against his stomach. He rested his hands on my head.

I looked up at him, and his hands slid down to my shoulders. “Ben will have enough loved ones to entertain the whole surgical ward.”

“Good.” He pulled away and walked over to the window, then came back to the desk. “I’m going to work on the comic for a little while. And maybe paint, I had an idea about something I want to try.”

My cell phone rang after Justin left the room. It was Michael, calling to go through the same boring recitation of all his worst fears, interspersed with my dispassionate logical treatises on why none of it would happen, followed with him accusing me of being the most pessimistic person who ever lived, and who was I to tell him things would work out in the end?

There was really nothing to say to that, so I told him I’d see him in the morning.

**Justin’s POV**

The day of Ben’s surgery, Brian got up at 5 and stumbled into the shower. I went down and started the coffee, and while it was brewing, he came into the kitchen in bare feet, his hair wet, and wrapped himself around me.

I held onto him for a while, and when the coffee was done, I went back upstairs with him and watched him get dressed.

He looked at me. “You’re going back to sleep, aren’t you?”

I nodded. “I’m just the sidekick. We get to sleep late.”

He bit back a smile and nudged the side of the bed with his foot. “I’ll call you when we know anything, but you know how they are about cell phones there.”

“Okay. Tell Michael to call me if he needs me to do anything. Or wants anything.”

He nodded and headed out, and I went back to sleep.

I opened the store at 11, and I was still turning on lights when my phone rang. I dug it out of my jacket pocket.

“Hey.”

“Hey. He hasn’t gone in yet. Three hours late, so we’re right on schedule so far.”

I laughed. “Okay. How’s Michael?”

“Being brave for his man, but I’m sure as soon as they take Ben away he’ll release his inner drama queen.”

“Hunter?”

“Irritating but stoic.”

“Debbie?”

He groaned. “Don’t ask.”

I hesitated. “How about you?”

“Me? I’m fabulous, sucking down hospital coffee and watching Mikey hold the Professor’s hand. I couldn’t be better.”

I heard the sound of traffic. “Where are you?”

“Out front using my cell phone. Wouldn’t want to accidentally disrupt someone’s brain transplant with an untimely call.”

“Okay, I’m just opening up now, call me when they take him to surgery, so I know.”

“Later.”

“Later.”

I didn’t hear anything more until 2, when Debbie called. She said they’d taken Ben in ten minutes before, and they were all going to get something to eat and then wait.

I closed up at 6, and still didn’t know anything. It had been pretty quiet all day in the store, probably because by lunchtime it had started sleeting again. I wished it would either snow or rain instead. But I processed almost seven hundred dollars of sales on eBay and the website.

I was just getting ready to drive over to the hospital when my phone rang.

“What’s going on?”

I heard Brian lighting a cigarette, but I ignored it. “He’s out of surgery, and Michael’s with him. They said only one person can be in there tonight, so I’m going to go by Kinnetik and pick something up, and then go home.”

I told him I’d see him there, and hung up.

It was almost 7:30 when I got home, because of the crappy weather, and there was no sign of Brian. By 9 I was getting pretty worried, but his cell was rolling straight to voice mail. I was sitting in the media room trying to watch TV, but there was nothing on. I went into the kitchen and made some eggs, and carried the plate over to the computer.

I set my plate down on a stack of papers on the desk, and it wobbled a little. I pushed the papers back and saw a box. It took me a minute to realize what it was, and that Brian must have gotten it out the day before, when he had the safe open.

I sat at the desk and opened the box, and looked at the rings. I wondered what Brian was doing with them. There were times I didn’t know what the fuck was going on in his mind.

I heard his car, and then the garage door opening and closing. I almost hid the rings back under the papers, but I decided that was stupid, and I just sat there.

When he came in, he went straight to the bar and poured a drink. He knocked back half of it, then looked at me. He lifted the bottle in his left hand and lifted his eyebrow. I shook my head, and he finished the rest of his drink.

And then he saw the rings in my hand. I put the box down and got up. I didn’t feel like talking to him about the rings right then.

“Any news?”

He shook his head. “They said it went fine, we probably won’t know anything more until tomorrow. Michael’s with him.” He poured another drink, then looked at me. “So, you were playing with our rings?”

I shrugged. “They were on the desk. Did you get them out yesterday when you had the safe open?”  
   
He didn’t answer, just took his drink over to the window.

I thought, fuck this. I walked over to him, and ignored the “no trespassing” signs, and wrapped my arms around his waist. He felt tense for a minute, then relaxed. He turned all the way around and pulled me tightly against him, and kissed me.

Sometimes Brian just needed to fuck, and honestly, sometimes, so did I. I knew he was freaking out, I knew he’d rather swallow ground glass than talk about it, and I was tired of being okay with that. 

I kissed him and let him tip my head back, his hands gripping my hair and his mouth moving against mine.

I heard his glass drop to the floor behind me, but I didn’t turn to see if it broke.

**Brian’s POV**

Justin was warm and easy in my arms. I dragged my lips down to his throat, then back up the side of his neck. I bit his ear lobe, and let my tongue flicker at his ear. He gave a little groan.

I slid my right hand inside his shirt, palm pressing against his stomach. I let my fingers brush just under the waistband of his jeans, and I felt him draw in a breath, pulling in his belly so my hand could slide inside. I cupped his cock through his underpants, feeling the wetness spreading through the rough cotton. He was rubbing himself against my hand, pushing hard on me, pressing my arm tight between our bodies.

I pulled my hand out, and reached around and gripped the backs of his thighs with both my hands. I was still kissing him, my tongue in his mouth, his head falling back. I bent my knees and lifted him up, pulling him into me. I walked him a few steps back, until his legs were against the sofa. I let his feet slide back down to the floor, and started to open his jeans and push him back. He stopped me.

“Come to bed.” His voice was husky.

I let my forehead touch his, and started to follow him out of the room. He was holding my hand, and he turned and smiled at me over his shoulder, and I felt a wave of restlessness hit me. I pulled on his hand and tugged his body back against mine again, kissing him hard. He pulled away, and put his hands on either side of my face, and looked at me.

I just stood there.

Justin tried again. “Come up with me.”

I shook my head, and walked back over and stared out the window. I half wanted him to come back and try to make me come to bed with him, and half thought if he did, I’d put my fist through the glass.

His hand was on my shoulder, and I almost jumped. “Brian….”

I didn’t say anything, and I heard him sigh. He brushed a kiss against my neck, and I felt my jaw tense.

I turned and looked at him. He had that patient look on his face.

“I’m going out.” That made his face change, but just for a second.

“Okay.” He said it slowly.

I looked at him for a minute. “I just need to go out.”

He nodded. “I said okay.” I started to say something, and he cut me off. “And yes, I know you don’t need my permission. Do whatever you want, Brian.”

I snorted. “You do very well as the understanding wife. You should be proud.”

He didn’t say anything, just stood there. I walked away from him, over to the desk, and then turned around.

“You know, Justin, it’s not cooking that makes you the wife, and it’s not getting fucked in the ass that makes you the wife. It’s not these fucking rings that make you the wife.” I brushed the open box off the desk, onto the floor. “It’s being _understanding_ , that’s what makes you the wife.”

Justin had watched me swat the rings onto the floor, and his jaw tightened. “Stop it, Brian.”

I walked over to the bar and got a new glass, and filled it. I looked at him. “I guess you learned that from your mother. I’m sure Jennifer was always very understanding about Craig, too.”

Justin looked me right in the eye. “Do whatever you need to do, Brian. But get the fuck out of here.”

I stood there staring at him. He turned his back on me and went upstairs.

I waited a few more minutes for my heart to stop hammering, then I went into the hall and grabbed my jacket. I dug for the keys to my fucking rental car, but they weren’t there. The little asshole had taken them upstairs with him.

I pulled out my cell phone and called the car service, and used the time waiting for them to finish the rest of the bottle of scotch. By the time they got there, I was thinking just passing out on the sofa might be a good idea, but I got in the car and had him take me to Babylon. I walked into the club, and everyone looked surprised to see me. I realized I hadn’t been there without Justin since last December. Nearly a year.

I went up to the office, kicked the door shut, and locked it. I kept scotch in the office, and I grabbed the bottle, and sat down at the desk. I could feel the music through the walls and floor, and after a while the beat seemed soothing, almost like a heartbeat. I walked over to the sofa and lay down, the bottle open on the floor beside me. I stared at the overhead light, and thought about having the lighting in the office redesigned. It was too harsh. And then I closed my eyes.

**Justin’s POV**

I only stayed upstairs until I heard Brian slam out the front door. I went back down, and put his keys on the hall table, and went into the media room.

There was an empty bottle on the floor by the sofa, and the rings were where they’d fallen when Brian knocked them off the desk. I picked up the box and put it on the desk, then picked up the rings and closed them in my hand.

I walked over to the window, and looked out, thinking of all the nights in the year since I’d been home that Brian had stood there, staring out. The Christmas lights made shadows and reflections on the ground and the trees, and I let my forehead rest against the glass.

After a few minutes, I looked at the rings again. They were identical, platinum, wide and a little dull, but with a soft sheen in the light. The edges were curved, making them look old, even though they weren’t. Brian had picked them out, his just a little bigger than mine.

I put mine on, and then put his on my middle finger, and then pulled his off again and just held it in my hand.

It started to sleet again while I was looking out the window, and a gust of wind made the lights flicker. I pulled back from the glass and thought about what I wanted to do. I could sleep, I could try to paint. I couldn’t draw, my hand wasn’t up to it. I could fuck around on the computer, or go to bed and stare at the ceiling, and pathetically wonder where Brian was.

The lights flickered again, and I went into the living room. I put Brian’s ring in my pocket, and piled some logs in the fireplace. I pressed the gas starter and it roared to life, the logs catching right away. I went and sat down on the sofa. I wasn’t sure if it was more or less pathetic to sit in here or lie in bed, but at least this was something different.

I pulled my knees up and wrapped my arms around them. The sleet had turned to hail and I could hear it pebbling on the glass roof of the hot tub room, and against the windows when the wind blew. The lights stayed on, though.

I sat on the sofa and listened to the hail and thought. I thought about New York, and all the nights I couldn’t sleep, missing him. I looked at the firelight on my ring, and the Christmas tree, and the wrapped presents under it. I remembered last year, and the look in Brian’s eyes when I walked in the kitchen door two days before Christmas. And I thought about him coming inside me, and me inside him, and the sound of his voice when he said my name.

I thought about him telling me he loved me, in the rain outside Babylon, in this room, in bed, when he came, his voice harsh and his hands gripping me so hard he left bruises. I thought about him telling me he’d bought this house, saying he was taking a chance on love.

On me.

I remembered the night before I left for New York, and the helpless way I loved him then. I remembered him lying behind me on the sofa, crying, telling me he’d thought I’d died after the prom, and how I thought that night I couldn’t love Brian more. Until I did.

I stood up and took Brian’s ring out of my pocket and put it on the coffee table, and put more logs on the fire. I pulled a blanket off one of the chairs and lay down on the sofa, and pulled it over me.

I never really went all the way to sleep, just slipped in and out of it, until I heard the car in the driveway, and sat up. I didn’t know where he’d go, if he’d go upstairs or look for me downstairs first. Depending on how drunk he was, he might not notice the tree lights were still on. He might not even come in.

But he did.

He came and stood next to the sofa, staring at me. His hair was sticking out all over the place, and his eyes were bloodshot and edged with red. His cheeks were red, from the cold, and his lower lip was chapped.

He folded his lips in, then out again, and stuck one hand behind his back. He pushed his other hand through his hair, and bit his lip. I almost laughed, but I was afraid it would make me cry, so I didn’t.

“Does this make you feel better, Justin?” His voice was quiet, but a little mocking, too. “The Christmas lights, the fire, the wedding rings?” He nodded at his ring, on the table.

I looked at him. “Yes.” I didn’t say anything else.

He sat down heavily on the sofa next to me, looking at his ring, and then at the fire. “I don’t understand that.”

“I know.”

He snorted. “God, I fucking hate it when you say that.”

I shrugged. “Get over it.”

He looked at me, one eyebrow raised. “Decided to try being a little less understanding?”

“Stop. Just stop.” I got up. I was absolutely not going to listen to this again.

Brian grabbed my left hand, and pulled me around to face him. “I’ll stop.”

I sat down and looked at him. “I don’t just mean now. This has to stop.”

He nodded. “I know.”

I laughed, and after a second, so did he, and pushed his hand through his hair again. He looked sideways at me, and bit his lip.

I took a deep breath. “Do you think it’s all romantic bullshit, Brian? The Christmas tree lights, and the wedding rings, and the fireplace?”

He shrugged but didn’t answer me.

“Because it’s all _your_ romantic bullshit, Brian. You bought this house, you bought this fireplace, you bought the fucking firewood. You bought the Christmas tree, and the lights, and you bought these fucking rings. I never asked you for any of this. Never.”

He turned his head, and his eyes looked hurt, but I just stood up, and picked up his ring from the table. “You can tell me it’s all bullshit if you want. You can throw our rings on the floor and tell me to fuck off. Go ahead.” I started to pull my ring off, his still in my palm, and Brian grabbed my hand and stood up. He didn’t let go of my hand, just pulled it up and shoved my ring back down on my finger.

“Don’t.” He had his forehead pressed against mine, and his hand was clenching so hard on mine it hurt.

I felt tears burn in my eyes again. “Why, Brian? Why shouldn’t I? You did.”

He shook his head, and dug his ring out of my palm, and pushed it hard on the finger of his left hand. “Don’t.”

I closed my eyes, and he just pressed his forehead harder against me, and held our hands together tighter.

“Brian…”

“Justin, Justin, please… just…” and he kissed me, and I thought, sometimes there just aren’t words for everything. He broke his mouth away from mine, and let go of my hands, and brought his up to either side of my face, his fingers lacing into my hair. He kissed my forehead, and then my hair, and looked at me. “I love you.”

He pulled me down on the sofa, and I crawled up onto him and pushed him against the arm, and kissed him. And we didn’t fuck, or talk. We just sat there in front of the fireplace, with the bullshit romantic fire and Christmas tree lights, and our wedding rings, and held onto each other until we fell asleep.


	6. Risks, Chapter 6

  
  
**  
Risks, Chapter 6**  
By Xie

“ _We do not believe in ourselves until someone reveals that, deep inside us, something is valuable, worth listening to, worthy of our trust, sacred to our touch. Once we believe in ourselves we can risk curiosity, wonder, spontaneous delight or any experience that reveals the human spirit._ ” -E. E. Cummings

**Brian’s POV**

I woke up on the sofa with Justin lying against me, sleeping. My whole body ached, and my head was pounding.

I shifted a little, and he woke up and tried to stretch.

He groaned a little. “I thought we weren’t going to do this anymore.”

“Sleep on the couch when we have eight bedrooms?”

He looked at me. “That too.”

I stood up and felt my back complain. “Fuck, how do lesbians do this?”

Justin stood up, and looked at me. “Do what?”

“Relationships. Fights. Sleeping on the couch.” I ran my hand through my hair, and thought I probably shouldn’t lift my arm again until I’d had a shower.

Justin walked over to the fireplace, where the gas was still burning even though the firewood was long gone. He leaned down and pushed the starter, and the fire went out. He stayed at the fireplace, but turned and faced me. “Are you going to freak out now?”

Great, just what I needed, another discussion. “I thought I did that last night.”

He gave a short jerk of his head, and walked over to the window.

I stared at his back, thinking about what to say. “Justin.”

He didn’t turn around.

I took a breath. “I’m exhausted. I stink. I’m probably still drunk. I need a shower and ten more hours of sleep.”

He just kept staring out the window. I walked over to him, put my hands on his shoulders, and turned him around. “I’m not going to freak out over the rings. I’m the one who bought the fucking things in the first place. Now, I need to go take a shower and get some sleep. Come upstairs with me.” Which should have sounded familiar to him, as that was the line that started the whole fight in the first place.

Or whatever it was.

He looked at my face for a long time. “I don’t feel like sleeping right now. You go, I’m going to make some coffee and work for a little while.”

I felt my lips turn in, but I nodded. “Okay.” Then I pulled him into my arms, which I think surprised him.

He wrinkled his nose. “God, you really do stink.”

I laughed. “I’ve smelled worse.”

He shook his head. “I’m not sure you have.”

I waited for him to laugh or smile, but he didn’t. Asshole.

“Brian?”

I looked at him, and raised an eyebrow, which made my head hurt. I lowered it.

“Brian, we just talked about our relationship.” Then he smiled. Like I said, asshole.

I lifted my arms a little higher and pulled him closer. “And now you want to fuck me.”

“Well, not now. But after you shower.”

He was leaning against me, and my body, probably to punish me for poisoning it so thoroughly the night before, betrayed me by letting my cock jerk against his thigh.

I looked at him for a minute, daring him to say something, but he just kept the innocent expression in place.

Let me repeat: Asshole.

He finally sighed, and pulled away. “Seriously. Go shower and get some sleep. I’ll come up later.”

I went up, and stood under the hot water, letting the stinking, booze-saturated sweat run out of my body. I washed my hair three times before it felt clean. And I still smelled stale scotch on the towel after I dried myself.

I crawled into bed and pulled the duvet over my shoulders, and then got back up again and went into the bathroom and drank water from the tap.

When I came back into the bedroom, I was half-tempted to get dressed and go downstairs, but I could just barely hear music from his studio, and I decided to try to sleep, after all. 

And when I woke up, I thought, another shower.

**Justin’s POV**

I worked on the computer for a couple of hours, and then decided to try some hand shading. While the panels were printing, I went into the kitchen and aimlessly looked around for something to eat. I opened a cupboard and saw the little packages of herbs from my acupuncturist. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d used them.

I pulled one down and put the water on to boil, made some scrambled eggs, and warmed up the cold coffee in the microwave. I chased the herbal tea with my lunch, even though nothing ever really took the taste out of my mouth.

I tried Michael, and was surprised when he answered his cell.

“Hi. I thought they made you keep your cell phone off at the hospital.”

I heard Michael thank someone. “They do. I’m in the cafeteria, getting coffee.”

“How’s Ben?”

Michael sounded happy. “Really well. They said he’s recovering amazingly fast, and they’re talking about moving him into a regular room tonight. Which would be great, because in the post-surgical rooms, you can only have one visitor at a time, and the chair barely fits next to the bed. My back feels like _I_ had surgery.”

“Tell Hunter I can cover at the store anytime, if he wants to visit Ben.”

“Thanks, Justin.” His voice was soft and I smiled a little. “He’s closing up at 4 today anyway, this weather has everything but Internet sales pretty much shut down, and he can do those from home. But I’ll tell him. My mom’s on her way, and then I’m going to go home and get some sleep. And thanks. Like I said.”

I said goodbye, and went back into my studio with my coffee. I spread the Rage panels out on my worktable. I thought about how much freehand work I needed to do, and decided I’d try drawing for half-hour stretches, to see if I could get it all done in one day.

I was shading the side of Rage’s face, in a scene where he thinks JT, who has been drained of all his powers trying to help Rage fight off an army of attackers, is dying. I looked at the image for a minute, wondering what had ever made me think turning all the worst things that had ever happened in our lives into a comic book was a good idea.

I put down the pen and walked over to my easel. I’d started a painting a few days before, although all I’d gotten done was the background. It was a strange shade of warm gray, a tone I’d never worked with before. My grays were always blue-based. I looked at my paints, and thought about getting them out, but as quickly as the impulse raced down my arm from my brain, I felt it evaporate. I touched the thick dried paint on the canvas, and went back to drawing.

Three hours later, I felt my hand cramp, hard. I let the pen drop, and realized my hand had been aching and tremoring for a while, but I’d been ignoring it. I sat there, rubbing it with my left hand, feeling pissed at myself.

I heard a sound at the door, and looked up. It was Brian, his hair sticking out all over the place, wearing a soft, faded pair of jeans, a white t-shirt, and bare feet.

He came over and sat down next to me, and I let him take my hand and start to rub it. I wasn’t sure I wanted him to, but considering I’d just put his fucking wedding ring on early that morning, I thought it was a little late to ask for my hand back.

I looked at him, and he was smirking. Brian wasn’t the only one who could lift an eyebrow.

He glanced at me. “I was just thinking about giving you a short lecture on your self-care issues, but decided to wait until I’d recovered from alcohol poisoning.”

I snorted. Then I thought, fuck it, and relaxed against the back of the chair, closed my eyes, and let him rub my hand.

“I talked to Deb, she said Ben’s doing better, they’re moving him to a regular room.”

I opened my eyes. “I talked to Michael a few hours ago. He was going home to get some sleep.”

Brian’s hand kept moving on mine, and he started prodding at the base of my thumb. I felt myself relax a little more, and realized my neck hurt, and so did my shoulders. I rotated my head, and then sighed.

Brian held my hand for a second, then let it go. He stood up. “I’m going to the hospital for a little while. Can you come with me? Or did you want to get some sleep?”

I thought about it for a minute, and stood up. “Sleep. Tell them I’ll come by tomorrow.”

I left everything spread out on the table and headed upstairs and got in the shower. The hot water felt good on my neck and back, and I held my hand under it for a long time, watching the tiny tremors stop, and finally feeling the muscles relax.

I rinsed my hair and turned off the water, and dried myself off. Brian had stripped the bed and put on clean sheets, and left the dirty ones in a pile in the corner of the bedroom.

I curled up on the clean sheets, pulled the duvet up around my ears, and dropped instantly into a deep sleep.

I woke up just as suddenly. It was dark out, and the house was completely quiet. I got up and pissed, then stood at the top of the stairs. There was a faint light in the hall. I went down, and found Brian sitting at his computer.

He looked up and smiled at me. He looked tired.

“How come you didn’t wake me up?” I walked over, and let myself lean on him a little, my hand on the back of his neck.

He brought his arms up and wrapped them around my waist, and put his face on my stomach. We’d never been very good at keeping our hands off each other for any length of time. Even when you could almost see the anger like red electricity between us, even when I thought if he touched me it would break my heart, we always ended up like this.

“You were tired.”

I sighed, and touched his hair with my hand. “How was Ben?”

“Asleep.”

“Did Michael get some sleep?”

I felt him nod against me, and then he pulled me down on his lap, hard. I wasn’t much for sitting on Brian’s lap unless he had his dick up my ass, but he held me tightly around the waist, and after a minute, I just let go and sat there, my chin on his head.

I wasn’t planning on saying anything. I didn’t know how long I’d been asleep, I didn’t even know what time it was, but I wasn’t sure I was up to deciding what to have for dinner, let alone talking to Brian about what had happened. So when I heard my voice telling Brian we needed to talk, I was more surprised than he was.

Brian just sighed. “I know.”

I stood up. “You told me once, whatever we were, we weren’t my parents.”

He gave a short, bitter laugh. “And not dykes in matching Vera Wangs. I remember.”

I decided not to mention the general lesbianic-ness of my sitting on his lap a few minutes before. “So, we’re not my parents. Or your parents.”

He didn’t say anything for a long time, and when I looked at him, I couldn’t read his face.

I folded my lips in, and tried again. “Brian…”

He got up and started to walk towards the bar, then stopped. I guess his liver objected. He turned and looked at me, one hand behind his back. 

He raked his other hand through his hair. “God, Justin, just fuck me and let’s get it over with.”

I had to laugh, even if it probably didn’t sound very happy. “Fuck you, Brian.”

He nodded. “Exactly.”

“Fucking isn’t always the answer.”

He just gave me a skeptical look.

I went and sat down on the sofa, where I couldn’t see him.

I heard him sigh. “Fine. We’re revising our prenuptial agreement. I gave up on the blowjobs on demand, you conceded on the driving in Manhattan, and we’re wearing the fucking rings. Anything else, or can we fuck now?”

I took a deep breath.  “I think we need to add a section about you not lashing out at me when you feel cornered.”

I made myself not look at him, but he didn’t say anything for a long time. I finally turned my head around, and he was just standing there. I was too tired to really get angry, but I felt a little rush of it, down deep.

I got up and started to leave the room. I felt everything just kind of crash in on me, and I was fucked if I was going to let him see me cry again. I was done.

But he followed me out of the room, and he reached out and grabbed my left wrist. I stopped, but didn’t turn around.

“God, Justin, do I get one minute to answer?”

I just shrugged. I was pretty sure I couldn’t talk. I didn’t feel like I had anything to say, beyond what I’d already said. I thought, it’s always going to be like this with him, he’s always going to be a little feral.

And then I felt his arms wrap around me from behind, and his mouth on my hair, and then on the back of my neck, and I turned around inside his arms and kissed him.

I told Brian fucking wasn’t always the answer, and it’s not. But that night, that moment, it was. I didn’t want to talk, and he didn’t know how, but I knew from his hands, and his mouth, and the press of his cock into my stomach, what Brian was telling me.

I told myself a long time ago, when I was leaving Brian for someone and something else, that I’d just imagined it. That I didn’t really hear the things he said without talking, those nights at the loft, under that blue light, his hands tracing down my spine, his fingers feathering over my thighs, his mouth hesitating before he kissed me.

But I did. I always had. And I did that night, too. I let Brian tell me what he wanted to tell me, the way he could tell me: That he loved me, that he was sorry, that he wanted me. I heard every word. I took him upstairs, and lay under him, and let him fill me with his tongue and his cock and his come, and curved myself up under him, so I could kiss him while I came.

I fell asleep with him inside me. I woke up with his leg thrown over mine, and his breath in my face. And I knew what he meant by that, too.

**Brian’s POV**

Justin and I were careful with each other the rest of the weekend. We went and visited Ben at the hospital on Sunday. I must have looked worse than I thought, because even though Michael was mostly focused on Ben, I saw his face react when he saw mine. He didn’t ask me about it, though.

I was almost relieved to go into the office on Monday, but I’d forgotten the accountant from hell missed nothing, absolutely nothing, and decided the ring on my left hand was an appropriate subject for humor in the workplace. Or what he considered humor.

Ted was sitting on the sofa in my office reviewing costs on the architect’s proposal for the space next door. I was half listening and half checking my email.

“So, where are you and Justin going on your honeymoon?”

I looked up. “Why are you still here?”

He looked blank.

“Didn’t I fire you an hour ago, the last time you brought that up? Why are you here?”

He smiled. “To make your life a living hell. Oh, and keep your company from going awash on the rocks of insolvency.”

I lifted an eyebrow. “I’m sure I could manage to find some other poor schmuck of an accountant who could balance the books without making inappropriate personal comments on my private life.”

He sat back. “One who’d be willing to put up with you? You might be surprised. You could end up going through accountants like you go through art directors.”

I stood up and got a bottle of water. I was still giving my liver a little rest. I faced Ted while I took a drink, then set the bottle down on my desk. “I’m a bad boss. I’m a bad son, a bad brother, a bad friend, and will undoubtedly make Justin a bad whatever I am. Now, can we get back to work with that understanding, or are you going to continue tormenting me?”

Ted looked at me thoughtfully, an expression of his that I’d grown to hate and fear. “You know, Brian, I’ve only met them a few times, but your mother and sister are cunts. You’re the best boss I’ve ever had, a not entirely shitty friend, and for whatever reason, Justin and Michael appear completely impervious to your efforts to excise them from your life the way you’ve done with your mother and sister. Who are, let me repeat, cunts.”

I picked up the bottle and drank some more water.

Ted decided silence was permission to say more. I made a mental note to not make that same mistake again. “And to quote Emmett, at least his words, I doubt I could do the hand gestures justice, your real family is the one you choose, not the one you’re born into. And he should know.”

He stood up. I thought about firing him again, but he cut me off.

“I know, I’m fired.” He picked up his laptop and the architect’s proposal, and went to the door. “See you in the morning.”

I considered going down to the art department and taking it out on them, but remembered I’d promised Cynthia not to go down there at all this week. I made a note to fire her the next time I saw her.

My cell phone rang, and I felt my gut tighten when I saw it was the auto repair shop. But somewhat amazingly, given the overall shitty state of the world, they were calling to tell me that my Corvette was ready.

I decided to give Ted and Cynthia one more chance.

**Justin’s POV**

I wasn’t in Red Cape ten minutes before Brian called me on the business line. Michael handed me the phone with a smirk.

“They invented these things called cell phones, you should get one someday.”

I checked my pocket. “Sorry, it was off.”

“That’s convenient.”

“What’s up?” I dropped my case and bag on the floor, and leaned on the counter.

“My Corvette’s ready.”

I laughed. “Thank god, I know how lonely you’ve been without it.”

“My Corvette doesn’t make fun of how I feel about you.”

I shook my head, still laughing. “Later.”

“Later.”

I reached across the counter to hang up the phone, and before I could pull my hand back, Michael laid his hand over it.

“Justin?”

I looked at him, confused. “Yeah?”

He tapped my ring. “You’re wearing a wedding ring.”

I blushed a little. “Yeah.”

Michael laughed. “Didn’t you stand here in this store and tell me it would take having Brian genetically altered in a terrible nuclear disaster for that to happen?”

I shook my hair back out of my eyes and shrugged. “And this won’t be the first time I’ve stood in this store and admitted you were right and I was wrong about something like that.”

He grinned. “Life really does imitate art. Maybe we’d better think our storylines through more carefully from now on.”

I laughed and set the case with the panels down on the counter. “This should be the final version, except for the cover. We had them on the wall last time, so we need something different, and I wasn’t sure which way to go without giving away too much story.”

Michael was turning the pages and nodding while I talked. “I guess this one is out of the question?” He was pointing to a panel of Zephyr in Professor Ken Kurschner’s arms.

I laughed. “Sure, if you don’t want to sell any comics this time.”

He smiled, and kept turning pages. “Something like this is good, lots of drama.” It was Rage behind the Governor, JT to his left, the Governor in the lower left hand corner of the page.

I nodded, and made a note. We kept looking through it, and finally got to the end. Neither one of us was really happy with anything yet.

I dug my sketchbook out of my bag, and a pen. I sat down cross-legged on the floor. “How about… something with Rage and JT in the middle, right after Rage takes the risk of letting his mind control powers drop….”

Michael sat down next to me, and looked at what I was drawing.

“And then…” I sketched rapidly, just the outlines. “A whole circle of small panels around them, with scenes from the issue. The zombies, the one with the Governor we both liked, even the one of Zephyr and Ken.”

I kept drawing, so he’d see the general idea, and then glanced at him. He was smiling.

We talked about which scenes to use in the small panels, and I sketched a few versions. He made one coffee run while I drew, but finally he stopped me. “Don’t think I don’t see your hand shaking.”

I picked up my coffee in my left hand, took a sip, and shrugged. “We’re done anyway, right? I’ll draw this up, and hopefully we can have a final version before I go to New York.”

Michael nodded, and started putting the panels in their case, and then put the case in the back room. I finished my coffee.

“How’s Ben?”

Michael shut the back room door and went behind the counter. “He’s great, no one can believe he’s doing this well. They’re actually talking about starting the new drugs at the end of January.”

I helped Michael lock up, and headed to my car. If Brian was picking his Corvette up after work, I wasn’t sure if he’d be home late or not. I stopped at Whole Foods and got overpriced gourmet takeout.

When I got home, Brian wasn’t there yet. I ate at the kitchen table, then went into my studio to work on the cover for Rage.

**Brian’s POV**

I heard music in the studio when I got home, and went upstairs to change. Justin must not have been too involved in work, though, because he came into the bedroom right behind me. I could see his hand was fucked. I didn’t mention it.

“So, did Rage get them down off that fucking wall yet?”

Justin laughed. “Wouldn’t you like to know?”

I walked to the closet door and took off my jacket, and hung it up. “Actually, yes. Did he?”

I turned around, and he was looking at me, almost smirking. I lifted an eyebrow.

Justin relented. “Yes, they’re down off the wall.”

I turned back to the closet, pulled off my tie and started to unfasten my shirt. “I suppose you had JT save him this time?” I didn’t look at him.

He didn’t answer right away. “No, JT’s unconscious, remember?”

I didn’t turn around. “So, what happens?”

He came up behind me, and put his hands on my bare shoulders, and then slid them down and started unfastening my belt from behind me. “Don’t worry, Rage, you save JT. And Zephyr. And all of Gayopolis.”

I smiled, even though he couldn’t see it. He had pushed my pants down and was holding my balls in one hand, and my dick in the other. I tipped my head back, and just let him slowly get me hard. I felt his breath on my back.

He took his hands away, and I turned around. I pulled him close to me, holding him with one arm around his back, under his arms, and the other shoving his sweatpants down. He pulled them off, kicking his shoes away, and then we broke our kiss long enough to pull his sweater off over his head. I stepped out of my pants and shoes, and walked him backwards to the bed.

Justin sat down, and then scooted backwards until his head was on the pillow, and I was lying between his thighs. His legs wrapped around me, and I kissed him. First his mouth, then his jaw, and then his neck. I could feel the pulse in his throat pounding under my tongue.

I ran my hand up Justin’s arm and cupped it behind his neck. I kissed along his jaw, and put my mouth at his ear. “I want to tie you up.”  
   
His breathing changed when I said it, and I could feel the heat in his cheek, pressed against mine.  
   
He didn’t say anything for a minute. “Okay.” He barely breathed it.  
   
I pressed gently on his shoulder and he lay face down on the bed. I sat there next to him, and he turned his face towards me, and slowly put one hand, then the other, up near the edge of the bed.  
   
I knelt up and opened the cabinet on the nightstand, and pulled out two black silk ties. Justin blinked when I set them on the bed in front of his face.  
   
I leaned over him, and kissed his arm from his shoulder to his wrist, lingering with my tongue over his pulse before I slipped the tie around the bed frame, and then twined it around his wrist, and then fastened it. I straddled him and did the same on the other side, kissing his arm and then binding his wrist to the bed. His cheeks were blotched with red, and his eyes were half-closed.  
   
I kissed down his back, tracing his spine with my tongue, kneading his ass with my hands, pressing his thighs together with my knees. Then I slowly leaned over and pulled one more tie out of the cabinet, and laid it on the bed, where he could see it.  
   
I saw him swallow, and then lick his lips. He blinked, slowly, and then looked at me. I just looked back, waiting.  
   
After a minute he very slightly lifted his head off the bed, and parted his lips just enough for me to slip the silk tie between them. I tied it behind his head, and looked at the black fabric running across his pale skin and blond hair, and holding his lips apart. I leaned down over his face and licked first his top lip, and then the bottom, nibbling at it, and then traced the tie with my tongue, too. He was breathing hard and I heard a moan in his throat.  
   
I sat back on my heels and looked at him. He was rocking his hips into the mattress, and I stopped him with my hand on the small of his back. I pressed gently and he let me shift him up onto his knees, his ass in the air. I moved my legs so they were between his, and used my knees to spread him wider. His cock and balls were hanging heavy under him, and I slid my hand down and let my palm run lightly the length of him, and my thumb sweep across the leaking head.  
   
Justin had his head turned and was looking back at me, and I kept my eyes locked on his and sat back again. I slowly started to stroke my cock. I saw him swallow, and he watched me, not even blinking. He was breathing fast.  
   
My stomach clenched hard when I looked at him, his arms stretched out, the black ties wrapped around his wrists. His hair had fallen across his eyes. I started to move my hand faster on my dick. I saw the exact moment he knew what I was going to do, and he tightened his hands on the ties holding him to the bed frame.  
   
I kept looking at him, even when I wanted to throw my head back and close my eyes. I pulled hard one last time on my cock and let myself shoot streams of come across Justin’s back and ass. He was whimpering behind the gag, and I felt a groan wrenched out of me, too. I lay across his back, holding my weight on my left arm and dragging my right hand through my come where it was pooling on his back, and down the crack of his ass. I put a wet finger at his hole, and pushed it in. He opened up to me and then clamped down on my finger, and I waited for him to relax again, and shoved my finger in deeper.  
   
Justin moaned again, and I pulled my finger out and slapped him across the ass. I saw a jolt of surprise run through him, and he pulled his ass away, then arched it back towards my hand. I slapped him again, hard, right across the come-smeared red mark on his ass cheek, and he moaned. I told him, “Quiet,” and he turned his head and pressed his face into the mattress.  
   
I reached up and firmly turned his head back, and told him to open his eyes. He took in a shuddering breath through his nose, and nodded. I bent down and kissed his neck, and started licking my come off his back, and then sat back up and smacked his ass again, this time on the other side. He didn’t make a sound, and he didn’t move.  
   
I shifted over to the left side of him, and he watched me. I got a dildo out of the drawer and he just looked at it, then back at me. I smiled, and brought it up to my mouth and licked it, then wrapped my lips around it, and took it as deep into my throat as I could, breathing through my nose as I slowly slid it in, then back out.  
   
Justin’s eyes were dark and glassy, and he followed my hand as I moved the dildo to his back, rolling it in the come that still laced across his skin. Then I took the lube out of the drawer and let him watch me drizzle it all over the dildo, and spread it with my fist. He was just staring at me, his ass arched high, his cock hard, and dripping on the bed.  
   
I climbed back over him and knelt between his spread legs, and cupped his full balls in the palm of my lubed right hand, and then slid it forward to stroke his cock with a feather touch. He made a strangled noise in his throat, and I pulled my hand back and slapped the inside of his thigh. He jerked away from me, then moved back, his ass straining towards me.  
   
I held his cheeks apart with one hand, and pressed the head of the dildo against his hole with the other. I slowly rotated it and pushed, feeling Justin bearing down and letting it in at the same time. I moved it in, inch by inch, angling it away from his prostate until it was almost all the way in. He was hardly breathing, just watching me over his shoulder, his eyes dark.  
   
I started fucking him with it, and let my other hand move back to his cock, this time feathering my fingers over it, too lightly to get him off, and flicking my thumb over the head, smearing his pre-come. His cock was so hard I knew he was close to coming, and I angled the dildo to stroke across his prostate.

Sweat had broken out on his forehead and neck, and in a light sheen across his back and shoulders. I prodded at his prostate with the head of the dildo, and saw his balls pull up, and right at that moment I flipped the switch on the dildo. The vibrations started just as I pressed it hard against his prostate, and he almost screamed behind the gag. He started to come, shooting all over his chest and belly, and the bed underneath him.  
   
He came hard, and I could tell when it was too much, and turned off the vibrator and gently moved it out of him. He collapsed onto the bed, and I unfastened the gag and kissed him the minute I pulled it away from his face. He lifted his head and kissed me back. I pulled away to untie his wrists, and he turned over and curled into me, while I rubbed his shoulders and kissed him again.  
   
He wrapped his arms around my neck, and his legs around me, and kissed me, then burrowed his head into me. I held him, stroking his hair.  
   
 **Justin’s POV**

The day before we were leaving for New York, I went out and picked up some herbs in capsules from my acupuncturist, so I could take them in New York without having to make the tea. I also did some last-minute Christmas shopping. I suppose it’s insane to shop in Pittsburgh the day before you leave for New York, but I was too nervous about the show to think about shopping there. On the way home, I stopped at Whole Foods and got a few things for dinner.

Brian was in the kitchen when I came in the door from the garage. I carried the grocery bag to the counter, and kissed him as I passed. His face felt warm against mine.

I set the grocery bag down on the counter, and shrugged out of my jacket. Brian took a swallow of his beer, and watched me putting the groceries away.

He smirked at me over his beer bottle when I put ice cream in the freezer. Full fat ice cream.

I smirked back. “So, did you notice the neighbor’s inflatable Santa’s sleigh is deflating just like Frosty did last year?”

He nodded. “Well, that’s what they get for shopping at the big Q.”

I shook my head. “That thing is from Hammacher Schlemmer and it costs nine hundred dollars.”

He stared at me. “How the fuck do you know that?”

“My mom. I had lunch with her today. She was out here showing a house and she saw it, and mentioned it to me.”

“How is dear old mom?” He finished his beer and tossed the bottle into the recycling bin.

“She’s a little pissed.”

He raised an eyebrow. “About….”

I held up my left hand. “She wanted to know if we eloped.”

He laughed. “What did you tell her?”

“I told her it was a small, private ceremony, just you and me.”

“What did she say to that?”

“Not to expect a gift.” I grinned at him.

He nodded. “I really like your mother.”

“You know, she really likes you, too.”

He walked over to me and put his arms over my shoulders, and touched his forehead to mine for a second. “What’s not to like? Any mother would be thrilled to have me marry her only son.”

I snorted. “Skipping over the early years.”

He kissed me. “Of course. I always skip those when I’m talking to your mom, otherwise it’s just too weird.”

I went back to putting my stuff away.

Brian got another beer out of the refrigerator. “So, did you finish Rage?”

I nodded. “All ready to go to the printer. I dropped the final drawing for the cover at Red Cape this afternoon. Only a month late.”

He frowned. “You always said the first deadline wasn’t realistic.”

“I know.” I finished putting everything away, and got myself a beer.

“So now that it’s all done… are you going to tell me what happens?”

“I told you. Rage saves JT, Zephyr, and Gayopolis.”

“Yes, but how?”

I laughed. “God, you’re worse than Gus. Hang on.”

I went into the studio and came back with my laptop. I sat down at the kitchen table, turned it on, and opened my graphics program. I pushed it around to face him. “Knock yourself out.”

Brian sat down and started reading, scrolling through the pages with his finger on the touchpad.

I pretended to drink my beer, but watched his face the whole time. He only looked up once, then went back to the screen when he saw me watching him.

When he was done, which didn’t take long, he sat back in the chair and looked at me. He’d finished his beer, and he reached across and grabbed mine, and took a long swallow. “That was intense. I’d even say, that was art and literature and sheer genius, if I wasn’t fairly sure you’d just smirk and say you knew that already.”

I felt my face break into a smile. I couldn’t help it. “It’s alright.”

Brian laughed. “Asshole.”

“I learned from the master.”

He scrolled aimlessly through the panels. “This is all highly metaphorical, isn’t it? Michael must be very proud.”

“It’s a comic book.”

He snorted. “Rage has to risk losing everything, even his own life, and JT and Zephyr’s lives, on a hunch.”

“It’s more than a hunch, he’d seen the zombies fall when his mind control faltered for a minute. He knew that his mind control energy must have been what was powering the reanimation. He was operating on a deeper, super-hero level of intuition.”

“A hunch.”

“Whatever. It worked.” I took my beer back, but the bottle was empty.

“And his previously-vanquished enemies, they’re all permanently dead now, right?”

I laughed and got up to get another beer. “I promise.”

We left for New York early the next morning. We were flying instead of driving, since we decided our relationship had already had enough stress for the month. When we checked into the hotel, we found we’d been upgraded to a penthouse suite, with a terrace and the hotel’s usual great view. Unfortunately it was December, and the terrace was covered with snow. But it was very seasonal.

We went out to dinner and a couple of clubs, and the next morning Brian went shopping. I went with him, even though shopping with Brian tended to exhaust me, because I was too nervous to think of anything else to do.

We were meeting my new agent in the bar right before the opening, and we’d gone back to the room to get ready. Brian got a call just as we were heading down, so I told him I’d see him in the bar. Virginia was already there, and she smiled when I joined her.

“I stopped by the gallery on my way here. It looks wonderful, Justin.”

I smiled back. “I thought so, too. I went by this morning.” I knew I sounded nervous.

“That’s not all. I spoke to Armand when I was there.”

I waited. My throat felt dry.

“Justin. Everything of yours has already sold.”

I just stared at her. Brian had bought the Kinnetik series before the show, but that meant eight other pieces had sold. Before the show even opened.

“I’m sorry I was delayed.” It was Brian, his hand on my shoulder. I looked up at him, and he was at his most polished and perfect, in a suit such a dark brown it looked black, and a deep red shirt.

“Virginia, this is my partner, Brian Kinney. Brian, this is Virginia Marshall.”

They shook hands, undoubtedly identifying the designers of each other’s clothes and shoes in their heads. I just sat there, still stunned.

We ordered, and Virginia raised an eyebrow at me. I cleared my throat. “Virginia went by the gallery, and Armand told her all my work sold.”

Brian put down his drink and looked at Virginia, who nodded. “Everything. Armand is ecstatic. And hates me.”

Brian smiled. “Good. If the gallery owners don’t hate you, you aren’t doing your job.”  
 **  
Brian’s POV**

Justin was sitting there, looking stunned, so I chatted with Virginia for a while about the New York art scene. She surprised me a little. He’d said she was the first agent who he felt understood what he was doing with his work, and I’d expected someone a little edgy, almost an older, more established version of Kalli.

Instead, she was probably in her late 60s, maybe older, with sleek, short silver hair, dressed in merlot Armani from head to toe.

Justin snapped out of his shock after a few minutes, and he and Virginia talked about what collectors had bought his work. I recognized a few of the names as being particularly prominent collectors, and hid my smile while I swallowed my drink.

“Would you like another, or should we go?”

Virginia looked at me, and smiled. “I think we should go. I want Justin to meet a number of people, so it’s important he be there from the beginning.”

We got into the car, and I told the driver to take us to Armand’s gallery in Chelsea.

Justin looked at Virginia. “Will there be press?”

She shrugged. “Probably, but not definitely. Emerging artist shows can be hot stories, or totally ignored, usually depending more on what else is happening in the scene that month than the quality of the work.”

He nodded, biting his lip. I let my fingers brush across the back of his hand where it lay on the seat between us. He turned his hand over, and entwined his fingers with mine.

Virginia glanced at him. “Just be yourself, focus on the work, and if they ask about Rage or how young you are, you know what to say.”

Justin nodded, and I squeezed his hand a little.

We got there a few minutes before the show opened, and Kalli was standing in the middle of the room, staring up at the high ceiling. She grinned at Justin when he came in, and gave him a hug.

“Did you hear? You sold out.”

Justin nodded, and hugged her back. “Virginia told me. I can’t believe it.”

I went to the bar and got a glass of wine while the three of them wandered around, and after a few more minutes, the show opened. Virginia unobtrusively steered Justin to the people she wanted him to meet, and before half an hour had passed, Justin didn’t look nervous anymore.

I was leaning on the end of the bar, watching him gesture at another artist’s work while talking to a couple Virginia had introduced to him, when I heard a familiar voice. “Brian, I somehow thought you’d be here.” It was Richard Bohling.

Richard got a glass of wine from the bartender, and leaned on the bar next to me. “I got an invitation from Armand, and decided to stop by. It’s going well, it seems.”

I nodded. “Justin’s pleased.”

“Which is his work?”

I took him to the back of the gallery, and smiled to myself when the fact that Justin’s work had the prime space in the show registered with Richard. And again, when he noticed that every piece had a small tag on its card, indicating it was sold.

He stopped in front of the one Justin had called “Night,” that wasn’t for sale. Armand had asked for twelve pieces for the show, and this was the thirteenth. Kalli and I both convinced Justin it should be shown as from the artist’s collection.

“Jesus.”

I took a sip of wine, and signaled to a passing waiter to replace my glass. “I know. I feel that way a lot.”

He took another glass, too. “I’ll be honest, Brian, I couldn’t believe it when you brought him to dinner that time. I would never have imagined you with someone like Justin.”

I didn’t say anything.

Richard went on. “I know he’s older than he looks, but I thought he was about eighteen. I know I pissed him off when I asked him his age, but he must get asked that a lot.”

I just raised an eyebrow and shrugged.

“Then I look at something like this…”

I turned back to the painting. “I know.”

I hadn’t talked to Justin since Virginia swept him off, but he suddenly appeared next to us. He was a little flushed, and he was smiling.

He took a sip of my wine and handed the glass back. “Hi, Richard, it was nice of you to come.”

They shook hands, and Richard nodded at the paintings in front of us. “I’d read the article about you in Art Forum, so I had high expectations, but I don’t even know what to say about your work tonight, Justin. It’s breathtaking.”

“Thank you.” Justin looked even happier.

Virginia reclaimed him, and Richard joined other friends, and I went back and watched from the bar.

I was starting on my third glass of wine, without question a record of moderation for me, even at art openings, when Armand joined me. “Quite a success for Justin.”

I raised my glass. “And for you.”

Armand gave a dry smile. “And for me. Although now that Virginia has gotten him into her clutches, I suspect my access to Justin’s work will be somewhat reduced.”

I thought about that for a minute. “Justin won’t forget you gave him his start.”

Armand nodded. “I liked his work from the beginning, but what he’s doing now? I’ve never seen an artist progress this much in one year. Never. The maturity and completeness of this work is beyond anything I expected, even given how impressed I was with the early pieces.”

“Kalli said the same thing, but…”

He laughed. “I know. It’s just as with Justin, their youth is an obstacle to believing in their abilities. But she’s also like Justin in that working with her, I’ve completely forgotten her age. She has extraordinary instincts.” He took a glass of wine off the bar, and sipped it. “And Justin has an extraordinary talent, and something most artists his age don’t have, the opportunity to devote himself to it full time.”

I wasn’t sure what he meant by that, but I bit back a caustic reply that I wasn’t keeping Justin, and just smiled.

When the show was over, Justin came and slid an arm around my waist. I draped my arm over his shoulder, and left with Virginia and Kalli to have a celebratory dinner. After we ate, Virginia told us goodnight. The three of us met some of Kalli’s friends at Richard’s club. He’d left my name at the door, and they were all suitably impressed when the doorman waved us in.

I was talking with Richard in the VIP room, when Kalli sat down at our table. She smiled radiantly at me. “He’s flying. In a strictly non-pharmaceutical sense.”

Richard laughed. “He should be.”

I took a sip of scotch and didn’t say anything. 

A waitress appeared and Kalli ordered a drink. “I was surprised to hear he’d signed with Virginia. She’s pretty much the top of the food chain.”

“Adrienne Bennett introduced them.”

Kalli nodded. “Although I’m not sure Virginia would even represent Adrienne.”

Justin dropped into the seat next to me, and put his hand on my thigh. “I just ran completely out of energy.”

I laughed. “I hope not completely.”

He smiled at me, looking a little evil. I put my drink down and stood up. “Kalli, can we drop you anywhere?”

She glanced at Richard, and shook her head. “Unless Richard’s going to kick us out once you leave, I’d rather hang out for a while.”

Richard laughed, and walked outside with Justin and me. I’d sent the car back to the hotel, and we got a cab. I wasn’t sure what Justin’s mood was. He seemed a little quieter than I’d have expected, but his eyes were sparkling and he was holding my hand.

I shifted myself a little, to see what he’d do, and he slid into the opening I’d created, his body warm against my side. I kissed his hair and smiled.

I went and took a shower, and when I came out, a towel around my waist, Justin was outside on the terrace, looking at the skyline. I stood inside, watching him through the glass, looking at the tall buildings, some of them edged with holiday lights, some just dotted with the random lit windows of Manhattan office buildings.

He turned around and saw me watching him, and laughed and came back inside. He walked into my arms, and I pushed him away. “Jesus, Justin, you’re fucking freezing.”

He laughed again. “Pussy.”

I yanked off the towel and snapped it at him. “Go take a shower and rinse that crust of ice off before you touch me again.”

I was in bed with only one bedside light on when he came out, and I slid over and let him get in.

He wriggled against me. “Hmmmm, nice and warm. Thanks.”

I kissed his forehead. Then I kissed him, and when he opened his mouth to me, I touched his tongue with mine and forgot I’d been planning on telling him how proud I was of him, how beautiful his work was. I just kissed him.

I wondered if he wanted to fuck me, but he didn’t seem to, spreading his legs when I rolled on top of him, arching up against me. I was sure of it when I let my finger touch his hole, and it was wet. I laughed against his throat and he laughed, too.

After we fucked, I lay holding him. I remembered my plan, then, but I couldn’t get the words out. I lay there for a while, just touching his hair. I finally sighed and pulled him a little closer.

He looked up at my face, and then put his head back down on my shoulder. He still looked happy.

I cleared my throat. “Do you miss New York, Justin?”

I’d had no intention of asking him that. I lay there wondering how the hell that happened. But he didn’t look surprised, just thoughtful.

“I’m in New York. How can I miss it?”

“Miss living here.”

“No, I don’t miss New York.” He moved his head to my chest, and curved his fingers around the back of my neck. He kissed my chest. “And I didn’t miss Pittsburgh when I lived here. I missed you.”

I rolled him over, and lay on top of him, pushing his hair back with both my hands, my weight on my elbows. I stared into his eyes, and he looked back at me. His eyes were absolutely clear.

There wasn’t really anything Justin could have said to me that would have changed how I felt. There was still something simultaneously icy and hot inside my chest when I thought about the last year. I still didn’t really understand why he’d come back. And I felt that way even though I knew, really knew, that Justin loved me.

Then I thought about his paintings, and the table in his studio spread with drawings of Rage, and the corner with his computer and his music, and his fucking cell phone he seemed permanently unable to remember to leave on, and I thought, maybe I don’t need to understand it.

He moved a little under me, and made a noise in his throat. I was still stroking his hair back, and when I looked into his eyes again, they hadn’t changed. Still clear. I wondered what mine looked like to him.

He smiled and surprised me by rolling me over. He straddled me, and I grabbed his hands, and he leaned his weight into them, his knees tucked under on either side of my hips. “The show went great tonight, didn’t it?”

I nodded, and felt my throat unstick for a second. “I’m proud of you.”

His face lit up, and he dropped his head down and kissed me, just a light kiss on my mouth.

I turned my lips in, and took a breath. I waited for my throat to relax and let some words out. “You really don’t suck even a little.”

He laughed. “You are such a complete asshole. You’re lucky I love you and am addicted to your dick, or I’d make you sleep out on the terrace, in the snow.”

He lay down flat on top of me, and kissed my chest. I wrapped my arms around him, and then reached down and found some blankets, and pulled them up. He settled against me, shifting his weight off to the side, leaving his head on my chest.

I played with his hair, and when I heard his breathing get slow and deep, I closed my eyes.


End file.
